Legion team improving
despite tight competition
By Mike Berger
Citizen Staff
The Canton
Edward J. Beatty Post 24 American Legion team won its first game
of the young season with a 3-0 win over Norfolk, as Dave Roberto
hurled a five-hit complete game on 87 pitches at home Friday
night, June 20. As of Saturday, the Canton American Legion team
was 1-4-2.
Canton has
tied Foxboro 0-0 and Needham 8-8 while losing to Stoughton 1-0,
Walpole 7-0, Walpole 6-4 and Dedham 12-8.
Roberto was
efficient and mixed his pitches well as he kept Norfolk off
balance. He was helped by the team’s leading hitter, Andy
Ferrera, who went 3-3 with two runs batted in.
Team
captains Charlie Beshwaty and Chris Ezepik said the team keeps
battling and plays hard and will improve as the season moves
along. Canton has entered a new division in Legion play, and the
competition is much steeper with Walpole, Norwood, Foxboro and
Westwood in the mix.
After seven
games, the captains said the team never gives up, plays hard,
plays good defense, hustles, and has speed on the bases, sparked
by leadoff hitter Jonah Francese. Ferrera and Beshwaty lead the
team in hitting, each hovering around the .300 mark; besides
Roberto, the team has seen good pitching from Gary Powers and
Trevor Boyce.
On Saturday,
Ryan Melaugh tried his hand at pitching and did well despite
spotty defense, as the Legion team made several errors in the
first inning and trailed at the bottom of the inning 4-0. The
team came back to score three runs and trailed 4-3 after two
innings on an RBI single by Beshwaty and RBI walks by Mike White
and David Khrakovsky. Dedham upped the score to 8-3 with four
runs in the third and two more in the fourth and sixth innings.
Canton kept
plugging away with RBI singles by Ezepik and a ground-out RBI by
Mike Cahill and the game ended at 12-8.
Melaugh,
Powers and Trevor Boyce pitched well at times but were
victimized by walks, passed balls and errors.
June 26, 2008
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