AUGUSTA — As career firsts go, Landon Foster won’t soon forget this one.
In one of those baseball anomalies only available in high school, Foster was re-summoned to the mound with two outs in the seventh inning, saving his own victory as Cony held off Waterville 8-6 Monday at Morton Field in a matchup of two of Class B North’s hottest baseball teams.
“This might be the first one,” Foster said of his win and save in the same game. “Coach has got all the faith in the world in me and my teammates, so he’ll take a chance on any of us any day and hope that we’re going to succeed.”
Cony won its sixth straight after piling up four runs in the fourth inning and three more in the fifth to give its arms some breathing room.
Cony (9-1) fell behind by a pair of runs early on before scratching out a lone tally in the third.
But the Rams waited out Waterville starter Gage Hubbard to get to the fourth, when two of Hubbard’s seven issued walks caught up to him. The first five Cony batters in the frame reached base.
With the Panther infield drawn in against loaded bases, Parker Morin delivered a two-run single up the middle to open the floodgates and chase Hubbard from the hill.
Cony’s bats continued cranking into the fifth against Waterville reliever Garrett Gendreau. Davis Kibbler’s single to right plated a pair to push the Ram lead to 8-3.
“(Hubbard) was at 90 pitches in the fourth inning,” Cony coach Don Plourde said. “We weren’t great, but we were disciplined. We were patient laying off high fastballs. We were opportunistic and we did the little things you need to do to win games — moving guys over, running the bases.
“Today was a grind.”
Down by an 8-3 count, the Panthers (6-4) rallied to score two in the sixth and another in the seventh before Foster — who had earlier given way to Morin on the bump — walked in from shortstop to get Waterville’s Alec Spaulding looking at a called third strike to end the game with the bases loaded.
“I got a couple of good strikes and a couple of close misses,” said Foster, who had run the count full against Spaulding. “I just said that the outside fastball was where I was going to win that at-bat, and if I don’t get it it is what it is. Thankfully, it’s what won us the game.”
Foster threw only 68 pitches to work through the first 4.1 innings before originally believing his day was done.
Plourde said he hadn’t envisioned bringing back Foster on the shortest of short rest.
“It was one of those things where his pitch count wasn’t high, and (Morin) was laboring a little bit,” Plourde said. “Landon, he’s a gamer. I can’t say enough good things about him. He wanted the baseball.”
Waterville struggled all afternoon to cash in on the opportunities presented. Not only did they leave the sacks full in the seventh, but Morin came out with one out in the fifth and a Panther run already in before getting a strikeout and a grounder to end the inning with no further damage.
In total, Waterville stranded 11 men on base, eight of those in scoring position, as its five-game winning streak came to an end.
“We just missed the timely hits,” Waterville coach Russ Beckwith said. “I was really happy with the effort. First week of the season, we probably don’t get back in that game. … We definitely have to capitalize more. We have to hunt out fastballs and drive them the opposite way.”
Spaulding went 3 for 4 out of the three-hole in the Panther lineup, while designated hitter Xavier Hamlin also enjoyed a 3 for 4 afternoon. Catcher Wyatt Grady was 3 for 5 with three runs batted in.
Travis Barrett
(207)522-0357
GWCNewEngland@gmail.com
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