ANDOVER — The Boxford Little League all-stars run the bases extraordinarily well … and as a result, they can keep on running to Saturday’s Section 4 championship game.
With Thursday night’s semifinal against fellow unbeaten Lynnfield tied going to the bottom of the sixth, Boxford used its speed to find a way to win.
First, Henry Pracht scooted his way to first base on a dropped third strike. After Henry Carrieri walked, Pracht stole third to put himself 90 feet away from the plate.
That’s when Graham McKenzie knifed a grounder up the first base line, which game Pracht plenty of time to slide in ahead of the throw for the winning run in a 4-3 win over the Pioneers under the lights at Andover’s Deyermond Field.
The victory adds another chapter to what’s already been an historic summer for Boxford. Not only has the Little League won its first ever District 15 title, but now Boxford sits one win away a trip to the Massachusetts Final Four next week. They’ll face the winner of Friday’s elimination game between Lynnfield and Billerican back at Deyermond on Saturday.
There were no shortage of heroes for Boxford in this one. Vincent Merullo helped save the day with his pitching by putting out a fire in the top of the sixth. Boxford started the frame ahead by a run and Lynnfield tied things up on a fielder’s choice grounder by Nico Mandel.
Merullo was summoned with the go-ahead run on third base and pulled off a Houdini like escape via a ground ball to second and a strikeout.
Not to be discounted was the mound work of Pracht (who was lifted after 20 pitches to preserve him for the rest of the tourney) as well as starter Ben LaChance, who went the maximum 85 pitches. LaChance held a potent Lynnfield offense to four hits and struck out five, hitting his stride in the middle innings and and striking out four in a row at one point.
Boxford trailed twice, 1-0 in the first and 2-1 in the fourth, but responded both times. Rhett Barnes reached on a fielder’s choice and game around on three wild pitches to tie the game at 1-1 in the third.
In the fourth, it was a two-out double by LaChance after a pair of Lynnfield errors that gave Boxford its first lead of the game, 3-2. A quick fifth gave Boxford a chance to close things out, but the never-say-die Pioneers managed to get the game tied up the sixth. That set the stage for Pracht and McKenzie to engineer the walkoff.
Lynnfield starting pitcher Matty Cavalho was also excellent, holding Boxford to four hits before reaching the limit.
For Boxford, Harry Stevens had a hit, stole a base and reached in all three of his at-bats while Brendan Foley and Jackson Surface provided the other base hits. Jake DeLeo made a few smooth plays for outs at shortstop, second baseman Bennett Taeger looked back the potential go-ahead run on the key grounder in the sixth and overall Boxford played error free defense.