Reed's Home Run Lifts Generals to D4 Final Four

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – Pittsfield High graduate Jack Reed said he understood why Uxbridge decided to intentionally walk the tying run ahead of his turn at bat in the seventh inning of Tuesday’s Division 4 State Quarter-Final.

 

But, boy, did Reed make the Spartans pay for that decision.

 

Reed crushed the first pitch he saw over the left field fence for the first home run of his varsity career and chased Morrie Fried around the bases with the winning run in a 4-3 walkoff victory at Springfield Central.

 

Reed’s blast sends the top-seeded Generals (20-4) to Wednesday’s state semi-final against No. 5 Millbury at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester.

 

Fried went to the plate with two out and nobody on in a one-run game having already hit a home run himself in a 3-for-3 performance that started with a hit on Monday at Clapp Park, where the teams were able to get in one inning before the field was deemed unplayable.

 

On Central’s artificial turf field, Fried had two more hits, including the solo homer that trimmed a 3-1 deficit in the bottom of the fifth.

 

Two innings later, he came up with Pittsfield down its last out after Uxbridge starter Charlie Criscola got a groundball and a strikeout to start the seventh.

 

Uxbridge opted to avoid Fried for Round 4 and take its chances with Reed, who was 1-for-3 in his first three at-bats.

 

“They put Morrie on, he’s a great hitter,” Reed said. “It makes sense in the situation. I came up just trying to do the job and ended up getting the job done.

 

“It’s a little bit personal,” Reed said when pressed about his feelings watching the Spartans take their gamble. “But put me up to bat, and that’s what happens.”

 

Pittsfield coach Drew Pearce agreed with Reed that the intentional free pass was understandable. But he had confidence in his No.  3 hitter’s ability to keep the line moving.

 

“I’m not at all thinking [home run], but I know he can,” Pearce said. “And I know he’s got that in him. But it’s a tough situation. I don’t know if I’d walk the tying run, but I understand it. Because he is on fire, Morrie, and he is not missing a barrel.

 

“But, yet, you walk him to pitch to a kid who’s hitting .460 behind him. So it’s a tough one. You walk a guy hitting .440 to face a .460 guy.”

 

The Generals and Spartans reunited on neutral – and carpeted ground – fewer than 24 hours after the game began at Clapp Park on Monday.

 

They arrived at Springfield Central tied, 1-1, after one inning of play.

 

And Uxbridge broke that tie with a run in the top of the third. Liam Kaferlein worked a leadoff walk and stole second ahead of Willem Haker’s two-out single to left to make it 2-1.

 

Two innings later, Criscola helped his cause with a leadoff single and moved up on a stolen base and a passed ball before Cody Veneziano delivered an RBI single to give the Spartans a two-run lead.

 

Fried cut the lead in half with his sixth homer of the spring in the bottom of the fifth.

 

Meanwhile, after a solid four-plus innings from starter Jason Codey (seven strikeouts, four walks, three runs), Pittsfield’s Simon Mele held the Spartans down.

 

After giving up a single to allow an inherited run to earn to start his outing, Mele retired nine batters in a row – seven by strikeout – to earn the win on the mound.

 

“I noticed that [Uxbridge’s hitters] were a little late on Codey, and I just felt like if I stuck with my fastball, they wouldn’t be able to catch up to it. So that’s what I stuck with for most of the day.”

 

The Spartans’ Criscola, who has committed to play ball at Division I Northeastern, rebounded after giving up a homer to Fried and a single to Reed in the fifth to retire seven hitters in a row before Uxbridge opted to put Fried on first.

 

Reed, who hit a walkoff single to give Pittsfield a 3-2 win in the Western Massachusetts title game, gave the Generals their third walkoff win of the post-season.

 

“First pitch fastball, middle-middle, and I just swung,” Reed said. “And it worked out.”

 

Now, PIttsfield, which went to the state title game a year ago, is one step away from getting back.

 

“A lot of my words are from experience in trying to keep an even keel, which, for baseball, is the name of the game,” Pearce said of his post-game talk with the team. “Never too high, never too low. And you’re never done until that last out.

 

“And we proved it today. And we’ve got to make sure that we live it and we celebrate it today and we celebrate tonight. But, when all is said and done, we have work to do.”