This was the moment for Telecommunications. All eyes were on the Yellow Jackets, the favorites to win the ‘B’ title. Under the microscope, though, they wilted early. The big crowd, the college field at St. John’s — it was all a little much for the young squad.
“This is our first time here in the championships,” freshman first baseman Sydney Resto said. “It’s hard. It was just nervewracking.”
The errors piled up in the first inning and American Studies took a six-run lead right off the bat. Telecom coach Glenn McCartney came out to the circle to calm his players down.
“When I went out to the mound, I said, ‘You’re nervous? I’m nervous. I’m 42 years old, I’m nervous,’” McCartney said. “But we’re here. We might as well play softball. If we lose, we lose, but let’s play the way we play.”
The rest of the way, they did. Top-seed Telecom got four runs back in the first inning and took the lead for good in the fifth to beat No. 3 American Studies @ Lehman College, 14-9, in the PSAL Class B softball championship Saturday at St. John’s University.
McCartney was in the game two years ago with a completely different team and lost a heartbreaker to Construction, now an ‘A’ powerhouse. No one celebrated more afterward than the 6-foot-5, burly coach, who did something resembling a pirouette when his players formed a circle on the infield dirt.
“He wanted it so badly and he’s such a great coach,” Resto said.
It was Resto that came through with the go-ahead RBI single in that six-run fifth inning. Another freshman, Desiree Vasquez, led off the inning with a triple that helped open the floodgates.
Telecom (22-0) needed a senior to help settle itself down, though, and that obligation fell on the small shoulders of ace and leader Liza Acevedo, who came back after a rocky first inning and made American Studies (19-2) earn everything else it got. Acevedo’s sliding catch of a little looper to her left hit by Rebekah Santiago in the sixth was one of the defensive plays of the game. The Senators had two runners on with two runs already in at the time.
“She’s 80 pounds soaking wet, but she’s a warrior,” McCartney said. “She’s the toughest kid at Telecom. She didn’t have her good stuff today, but she gutted it out. … She goes after every ball, it’s unbelievable. She actually fields the way an aggressive basketball player gets loose balls.”
Acevedo retired American Studies around a one-out single by Imani Graham in the seventh, but it was Resto who came up aces in the field in that inning. She made a great stretch on a Tiffany Mercado throw from third to retire Elizabeth Merrick and her caution-to-the-wind, running catch up against the Senators dugout robbed Rebecca Torres for the second out.
“Sydney played an awesome first base,” McCartney said. “She’s gonna be some player.”
American Studies coach Chris Ballerini felt that way about a few of his youngsters at the beginning of the season, but he surely wasn’t expecting the program’s appearance in the championship game. The Senators defied expectations by getting here, took a 6-0 lead in the top of the first, but could not sustain that output.
“I just think perhaps the moment was a little bit too big for us,” Ballerini said. “It’s the first time a lot of us have been in a situation where so much is on the line, there’s pressure, there’s fans. It seemed like we were a little out of sorts.”
Telecom had that same issue in the first inning before McCartney’s meeting. That seemed to right the ship and the Yellow Jackets won their first title.
“Well, when you have a guy like that coming out, it never really settles you down,” Acevedo joked, referring to her coach’s size. “But overall it worked.”