19U American Legion Baseball: Fairfield Sweeps Doubleheader From Shelton Behind Bats In Game One and Pitching In Game Two

CJ Montiero pitched a gem on Saturday

Fairfield 19U Militia swept a doubleheader from Shelton on Saturday morning at Kiwanis Field in Fairfield. It was the bats that did the job in the first game, and the pitching in the second. Fairfield won the first game 14-5 and then took game two in a pitchers' dual 1-0. 

In game one, Shelton took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first. Santino Defilippo led off the game with a walk. He moved to second on a groundout and third on a single. He came in to score on a pop up that dropped as Ryan Cowles and Blake Benway collided in shallow left field and the ball popped out of Cowles glove. 

Fairfield came back with five runs in the bottom of the second. All the offense in the inning came after the first two men were retired. The Militia loaded the bases and then Joey D'Elia reached on an infield single to second to bring in a run and tie the game. The next batter, Matt Sawyer singled to left to score Cowles and Joey Sanguiolo and give Fairfield a 3-1 lead. Jack Corcoran followed up with a two-run double to center to open up the lead to 5-1. 

Shelton would cut the deficit to 5-4 in the third. Spencer Keith hit a sacrifice fly and then Joseph Ciccone drove a two-run double to center field to plate to more. 

Shelton would tie the game in the fourth. Ben Cicale led off with a double. Later in the inning, with Cicale at third and Defilippo at first, Defilippo took off on a steal of second base and got in a rundown, allowing Cicale to come to the plate and tie the game. 

Fairfield would retake the lead in the fourth for good. With Cowles on third and one out, Sawyer lined a double to left that allowed Cowles to easily come home to score. Later in the inning, Charlie Mulhall tripled to right-center field as two more runs came in to give Fairfield some breathing room with an 8-5 lead. 

The Militia would extend that lead in the fifth. With two on and two out, Corcoran hit a hard ground ball to third that was thrown away, allowing D'Elia and Sawyer to score and put Fairfield up 10-5. 

Fairfield would cap the scoring an inning later when they put up four more runs. Sanguiolo drew a bases loaded walk to force home a run. Cowles then came up and singled to left to bring it two more. The final run of the came came home later in the inning when Sanguiolo scored from third on a wild pitch later in the inning. 

On the mound for Fairfield, it was the Hogan show. Phil battled through 3.2 innings, allowing five runs, four earned, on three hits, while striking out six. His brother, Edmund came on and allowed just one hit and one walk over the final 3.2 innings to pick up the win. 

In game two, Fairfield's CJ Montiero slightly outpitched Shelton's Joseph Ciccione in a game that was dominated by the two guys on the mound. Montiero had a perfect game going for a while, and a no hitter even longer into the game. 

Fairfield scratched across a run in the third. Joey D'Elia walked with two outs and then Matt Sawyer doubled to the right-center field gap to plate D'Elia and put the Militia up 1-0. 

Montiero shut down Shelton through the first four innings, not allowing a single baserunner. In the top of the fifth, Montiero would issue a one-out walk to Keith, but no hits, as Keith was stranded at first. 

Montiero then worked a 1-2-3 sixth and was three outs from a no-hitter. He got the first out of the seventh before Shane Santiago lined a clean single into shallow center field. Nick Dreyer was then hit by a pitch and suddenly, Shelton had the tying run at second and the go-ahead run first with one out. 

Montiero was able to work out of the jam and preserve the 1-0 win as he got a flyout to deep right, that allowed Santiago to advance to third and then Ciccone popped out to third to end the game and strand the tying and go-ahead runs on base.