Monarchs baseball: Raynor gets start, holds Tuckers hitless through 3 innings, but Mattituck bats come alive in 5th

Through four innings at Mattituck High School on Tuesday, it was hard to tell which team was 6-0 and which was 0-6.

McGann-Mercy’s Matt Raynor, the team’s starting catcher and relief pitcher, got the nod to start.

“He’s been throwing well so why not throw him out there?” Monarchs head coach Vinny Punzone said. “He’s been in relief all year and he’s been throwing accurate so I figured I would give it a shot.”

Raynor matched Mattituck’s Joe Tardif as both kept the opposing team hitless through three innings. Tardif walked, stole a base and scored in his first two at-bats, putting Mattituck ahead early 2-0.

Mercy scored on a catcher’s interference with the bases loaded in the fourth inning but Tardif refused to give up any more runs and so the game entered the fifth inning, 2-1 in Mattituck’s favor.

Mattituck’s coach Steve DeCaro tried to ignite a fire in his team before the inning, yelling, “two runs just ain’t gunna cut it today boys!”

They heard his plea.

“For us not to be hitting the ball all over the place, you’ve got to give credit to the Raynor kid,” DeCaro said. “We’re a good hitting team.”

Wherever that good hitting team was hiding early on, they came out and showed out in the fifth.

Ian Nish began the inning with a single and his brother James followed by ripping a home run over the right-field fence. Hits, walks, and hit-by-pitches later, the headache began and the bases were loaded for Marcos Perivolaris. He scorched a double down the left-field line for two RBIs to make it 7-1. Ian Nish got up for the second time in the inning and delivered another single for two RBIs.

“I knew we would explode eventually,” DeCaro said, laughing about it.

“We haven’t been shut down like that all season,” Nish said. “I guess the frustration came out in our bats and started hitting the ball harder.”

As if that wasn’t enough, Mattituck (7-0 League IV) added another two runs in the inning on an single by Will Gildersleeve and closed out the Monarchs, 11-3.

“Sooner or later we were going to figure things out and I wish it was a little earlier because I could have saved some grey hairs but we’ll take it,” DeCaro said.

Mercy (0-7 League VIII) played its best game game of the season according to their first-year coach despite the loss.

“Without a doubt our best game,” Punzone said. “We get the bats going there and it’s a whole different game.”

Game two of the series resumes today at McGann-Mercy High School.

RiverheadLOCAL photos by George Faella.