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Newburyport clinging to CAL title dreams

Monday, May, 19 By John Shimer
Staff writer

In his 35-plus years of experience, Newburyport baseball coach Bill Pettingell has never seen anything like what could play out in the CAL in the final week this year.

If North Andover loses either of its two remaining CAL league games to Pentucket or Masconomet, then Wilmington, North Andover, Masconomet, and Newburyport could share the CAL title four ways with a 10-3 CAL record.

However, the Scarlet Knights (13-3) hold all the cards carrying a one-loss better record at 9-2 then the other three, Wilmington (11-5, 10-3 CAL) has played its last CAL game, and both Newburyport (11-7, 9-3 CAL) and Masconomet (13-3, 9-3 CAL) need to win their final game to have any shot at a share.

"Wilmington certainly made it interesting beating both Masco and North Andover (in the Wildcats' last two league games) to bring everyone back to the pack," said the enthused Pettingell, whose team eliminated Pentucket from the CAL race Saturday with a 12-2 win. "I think there is going to be a lot of people rooting for Masco Tuesday, but we have to take care of business first against Amesbury.

"If we win and Masco wins we will all be in a four-way tie, which I don't remember ever happening," Pettingell continued. "It's pretty exciting to come down to the wire like this."

What this year's CAL race has showcased the most | on top of the fact that once again the CAL has some great baseball | has been the remarkable parity throughout the league.

Before Pentucket lost to Newburyport, it too had CAL title dreams. If Triton wins its last two games, they will become the sixth team of seven in the CAL Division 1 group to qualify for the state tournament, and the 10th team overall out of the CAL.

"The parity is there, it's good, it shows the CAL is pretty solid in baseball as always," Pettingell stated. "Talent wise, Amesbury and Pentucket are just as good as the rest, and certainly Pentucket is our equal.

"Our league is loaded with excellent coaching, I believe it's one of the best leagues in the state for coaching," explained Pettingell of the source behind what makes CAL baseball good year in and year out. "It makes each game a little tougher to win in this division."

Yet, if when everything is said and done, and the Clippers do get a four-way share of the title, their turnaround from a 1-4 start (in which they suffered 3 1-run defeats) might be one of the better stories not just this season, but in Pettingell's time with Newburyport baseball.

"This would be one of the coolest championships if we could get a share, especially the way we started," Pettingell said. "How much we struggled, and struggled to score runs, this would be one of the more impressive ones (titles) because we overcame so much adversity and so many obstacles."

Resiliency only begins to define what Newburyport has been able to accomplish. It's no secret the team has two staff aces in Tom Morris (4-4, 1.99 ERA) and Kyle McElroy (5-1, 0.70 ERA), but the Clippers did not go down-and-out after the bad start, they worked to improve.

"At the beginning of the year with Tommy and Kyle pitching so well, and with the rest of us not producing either at the plate or in the field it probably was frustrating even more so for those two guys," said Newburyport captain Richie Burke. "But, I think it shows what our team is made of, even we did get knocked down and things weren't going our way, we worked hard to get better at the little things. It just shows we were one step away from playing to our potential."

According to Burke, who has been on two other CAL championship baseball teams, a potential third championship would be the sweetest of all. But, it's that never say die attitude that Burke and the rest of his team have exemplified that has also made this such a special season for the coach.

"I don't know if I've ever enjoyed being around a group of kids more than this year's bunch," Pettingell expressed. "They just don't want to fail, they want to do well for the team and for Newburyport High School, and keep whatever traditions we have going."

With nothing settled, the final week of the CAL season should be a goodie. Stay tuned for updates.