GARDINER — Franklin County of Farmington and Gardiner squared off at Gardiner Area High School on Monday night in a reunion of old Zone 2 teams.

Each team went into the game having won two of its first three games, but Franklin County already had an extra win in hand before the first pitch was even thrown. That’s because a team in the new Zone 2 has already called it a season due to lack of players.

Andy Valley, which is based in Turner and draws players from Leavitt, Buckfield and Spruce Mountain high schools, is unable to continue its season due to a lack of players. Zone 2 commissioner Todd Cifelli said Andy Valley had barely enough players for its season-opening doubleheader June 21 at Rogers Post of Auburn — which Rogers swept 16-1 and 18-3 — then had only seven committed to play its next game against Highland Green of Topsham. Andy Valley then decided to forfeit the rest of the season.

Cifelli ruled that all remaining Andy Valley games would be considered a win for the opponent. With 11 teams now and an 18-game slate, Zone 2 plays an unbalanced schedule, meaning some teams will receive two wins from Andy Valley forfeits while others will receive one.

Besides Rogers Post, Bethel, Bessey Motors of South Paris and Tri-Town of Poland had doubleheaders scheduled with Andy Valley. Franklin County, Highland Green and Smith-Tobey of Bath had one home and one away game scheduled.

Cifelli said the options for the zone were limited. Reworking the schedule was out because fields have already been reserved and umpires scheduled for the games. Making last-minute changes would inconvenience too many teams, and the size of the zone tournament should minimize the impact of the extra free victory..

“I felt that was the right decision to make because with eight of 11 teams making the zone tournament, even though it’s an uneven schedule, I felt comfortable that everyone would get more than a fair shot at coming out of our zone tournament (to get to the state tournament),” he said.

Coaches from Gardiner, which would have played Andy Valley once (as would Augusta), and Franklin County agreed there wasn’t much else zone officials could do.

“It’s not fair to the teams that aren’t getting the second win, but at the same time, what can you do?” Franklin County coach Kyle Gunzinger said. “You’d like to play it, but if you eliminate that whole thing, then you’ve got uneven records and then you’ve got a funky way of trying to do your zone tournament.”

“We’ve still got to beat the other teams and win the games we can and then we’ll worry about those other guys getting the extra win,” Gardiner assistant coach Kevin Hachey said. “We’ll see how it pans out at the end. Unless we beat the other teams, it doesn’t really matter.”

Cifelli said state Legion baseball director George O’Connell ruled that Tri-Town had the right of first refusal for the remaining players from Andy Valley. Rogers Post and Pastime Club of Lewiston would have been the first choice due to geographic proximity, but both teams’ rosters are full.

Franklin County gets Spruce Mountain players from Jay, while Andy Valley drew the school’s players from Livermore Falls. Gunzinger said he would have liked to have rights to the available Phoenix, but understood why Poland gets priority.

“Poland only had 12 kids,” Gunzinger said. “I think it’s right for them to play on the same team no matter where it is. I’ve got two kids from there and I don’t know what else they have.”

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Gardiner started its season shorthanded, with coach Dan Burdin away on his honeymoon and several players away for vacation and other commitments. But after opening the season with a tough 6-5 loss at Bethel, it bounced back to sweep Smith-Tobey last Saturday,

“We were a little rusty, had one tough inning at Bethel. Other than that, we played pretty well. We strung a few hits together in the top of the seventh and got it to a one-run game but couldn’t pull it out,” said Hachey, who is running the team until Burdin returns Tuesday.

“The bats look pretty good. We haven’t fielded a full team yet. Kids have been out at Boys State and on vacation and they’re starting to trickle back in,” he added.

Hachey said the batting order looks deep, and should be able to manufacture runs on days when the hits aren’t plentiful.

“We’ve got a lot of speed. We should be able to get some runners on base and make things happen,” Hachey said. “We’ve got some good bats and some good speed. We should be tough up and down the order.”

Former Monmouth star Kyle Fletcher, coming off his freshman year at Thomas College, leads the pitching staff. The lefthander hadn’t thrown in a game in about two months before tossing a complete game in the loss to Bethel. Gardiner’s Nick Berube and Brady Smith threw in the doubleheader and Oak Hill brothers Jake and Jonah Martin are back to lend support.

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Franklin County opened its season by splitting a doubleheader with Tri-Town, then started its home slate under the lights at Hippach Field with a 5-1 win over Augusta.

Anthony Franchetti led the offense with three hits against Augusta, while brothers Ryan and Andrew Pratt had two hits apiece. But Gunzinger is still looking for more timely hitting from the Flyers.

“We’ve left a lot of people on base, which, that’s baseball. It comes back to bite you after a while,” Gunzinger said.

“We’ve got a good group of young and old,” he added. “We only have one college kid, and that’s the catcher, Andrew. We have three sets of brothers.”

Righthander Evan Roberts has picked up where he left off from last year with two strong starts, including the complete game win over Augusta.

“He’s only given up one (run) in each game,” Gunzinger said. “Going back to the zone championship last year, he’s only given up two earned in the last 23 innings.”

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Augusta is off to a 4-1 start, defeating Pastime and Rogers Post and sweeping a doubleheader with Brunswick. Thomas Foster out-dueled Jarod Plourde in the 1-0 win over Rogers. Taylor Lockart drove in the game’s only run with a single in the fourth inning. The game against Pastime was originally scheduled as a home game but was rained out. The makeup had to be moved to Lewiston do to a scheduling conflict. Augusta got its revenge by scoring five unanswered runs to win, 5-2. Reid Shostak had a home run… With the Fourth of July falling on a Saturday this year, there will be none of the regularly-scheduled doubleheaders in Zone 2 this week. Single games are scheduled for Friday and next Monday in addition to the usual Tuesday and Thursday slate… Bessey Motors’ Ryan Chickering was named Zone 2 Player of the Week. Chickering went 2-0 on the mound, allowing just one earned run in two complete games while striking out 20 to help Bessey roar out to a 5-0 start.

Randy Whitehouse — 621-5638

rwhitehouse@mainetoday.com

Twitter: @RAWmaterial33