BASEBALL: Seniors Went Out Winners

   The East Hampton High School baseball team and its fans said farewell to 11 seniors Saturday, and they went out winners, defeating John Glenn 4-3.

    Thus the Bonackers finished the campaign at 9-11, though undoubtedly they and their coaches, Ed Bahns and Will Collins, would have preferred an 11-9 ending, which would have gotten them into the playoffs.

    East Hampton almost pulled it off, but a 13-11 loss to League VII’s co-champion Bayport-Blue Point in the finale of that penultimate three-game series proved fatal.

    In recounting Saturday’s game, Collins said that East Hampton’s starting pitcher, A.J. Bennett, drove in two runs with a single in the bottom of the first inning, and that Glenn came back to tie the score in the top of the second.

    “It was fairly tight thereafter,” said Collins. “They got a run in the fourth, but we came back to tie it at 3-3 in the fifth. Michael Abreu led it off with a single, Andrew Rodriguez laid down a sacrifice bunt, and Jimmy McMullan followed with a big r.b.i. single.”

    Deilyn Guzman, who was to get the win in relief of Bennett, led off East Hampton’s sixth with a base hit. After Brandon Brophy flied out, Ryan Joudeh, the catcher, walked, and Bennett singled to load the bases for Rodriguez, whose subsequent walk scored Guzman with what proved to be the winning run.

    Guzman closed out the visitors in their seventh to end the season on a bright note.

    Five Bonackers were named to the all-league team, Collins said — Joudeh, Brophy, Guzman, Cameron Yusko, and Abreu. Bennett was academic all-league.

    Abreu finished the season with a 4-3 pitching record. His earned run average was 3.15, and his batting average was .315. He drove in 13 runs.

    The team’s seniors were Joudeh, Bennett, Yusko, McMullan, Guzman, Abreu, Rodriguez, Brophy, Russell Young, Fausto Mateo, and Mike Messemer.

    “Next year,” Collins said, “we’ll be very young.”