Westfield White resorted to the long ball to defeat a tough Cranford squad 15-9. Westfield connected on 3 early HRs, including a grand slam, to build an 12-3 lead early but Cranford refused to quit and chipped away to make it close. Scott Tupper came on in relief and shut the door on a potential Cranford rally to preserve the win.
Eric Varakian got White started in the 1st inning with a lead off double to deep right field. Chris Rinaldi followed with a hard grounder to 3rd which ended up in left field and then Nick Mele cleared the bases with a towering 3 run HR to left center field. Westfield added a 4th run in the inning courtesy of a Devin "The Animal" Anderson double and a hard grounder by Chris Boutsikaris.
Vincent "Madman" kept the Westfield offense surging with a lead off bomb of a home run to deep left center field in the 2nd inning. The blast was a wake up call for Westfield who then rallied for 6 more runs in the inning. Following the "Shot Heard Around Gumbert", Scott Tupper worked a walk and Michael Mobarakai then singled. Tommy Summers battled for another walk to load the bases and then Eric Varakian hit an RBI single. Chris Varano worked an RBI walk and with the bases loaded Chris Rinaldi stepped to the plate. Rinaldi jumped on a 2-0 offering and hammered a shot over the left center field fence for a grand slam giving Westfield a 11-1 lead.
Eric Varakian started on the mound for Westfield and kept the strong Cranford hitters off balance for 2 solid innings. He recorded 4 strike outs in only 2 innings of work.
Westfield added two more runs in the top of the 3rd inning. Brett Robertshaw jump started the offense with his 1st of 2 singles on the night. He scored on an RBI double to right field by Tupper. Tupper scored shortly afterwards on an RBI ground ball by Eric Varakian.
Chris "Mariano" Varano threw a solid 3rd inning and he used his patented "lift and wheel" move to pick off a runner at 2nd base. Scott "The Strike Machine" Tupper relieved Mariano and closed out the last 2 and 2/3rds innings with very strong pitching. Tupper changed speeds and elevations consistently and he was instrumental in preserving the Westfield lead.
Game notes...Varakian, Rinaldi, Anderson. Difilippo, Robertshaw and Tupper each had at least two hits and Mobarakai generated 2 runs via very aggressive base running.
Westfield plays 4 games over the weekend and they start things on Saturday morning with a game against Hillsborough in the Bridgewater tournament (10 AM).
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