The Wolcott baseball team was able to get three games in last week, but it was supposed to play four.
That fourth game was against Woodland, the last undefeated team in the Naugatuck Valley League. Unfortunately, rain postponed the Saturday afternoon showdown.
With the new alignment of the NVL’s divisions, Wolcott and Woodland occupy spots in the toughest one of all, the Copper. They are scheduled to play each other twice, and those games are going to come in a short amount of time. That amount of time is even shorter with Saturday’s postponement. The postponed game is now slated for this coming Saturday at 11 a.m. at Wolcott High. Before we get to that game, however, there is one scheduled for Wednesday at 4 p.m. at Woodland. We’ll see if that Wednesday game actually gets played. The forecast from the National Weather Service is calling for a 60% chance of showers.
Now that we’ve got the scheduling out of the way, how about the matchup? Woodland (9-0, 8-0 NVL) already owns wins over Holy Cross, Torrington and St. Paul. The Hawks have had strong pitching, including that of three-time all-state hurler Michael Belcher, but they’ve also played long ball effectively. Tyler DeCrescenzo has four of them by himself.
Wolcott (8-1, 8-1) sandwiched wins over Oxford and Crosby around its first loss, a 1-0, eight-inning contest against Naugatuck at home on April 17. Drew Rocca threw seven shutout innings in what wound up being a tough no-decision.
The Eagles graduated 14 seniors from last year’s Class M state finalist, yet they’ve been able to play well and win. Pitching has been key for Wolcott with solid efforts from Rocca, Michael McCormack, Logan Szep, David Cardinale and Zachary Lawlor. The Eagles have posted solid wins over St. Paul, Seymour, Torrington and Oxford. Rocca, McCormack and Cardinale are captains, along with senior Nicolas Kleinschmidt.
Caption: Michael McCormack, seen here playing against New Fairfield in last year’s Class M state semifinal at Muzzy Field, has been a key to Wolcott baseball’s success so far this season. (Copyright, Sports on CT-69, file)
