Palm Beach Lakes Ends 70-Game Losing Streak With 13-9 Victory Over Glades Central

The Rams prepare to take the field.

To the naked eye, Tuesday night’s baseball game at Palm Beach Lakes High between the host Rams and the visiting Glades Central Raiders was just another typical contest.

But to those Rams players, it was an exorcism.

Not one single player from the Palm Beach Lakes baseball team had ever enjoyed the thrill of winning a varsity baseball game.

On Tuesday night, that finally changed.

The Rams (1-0) ended a 70-game losing streak with a tough, well-earned 13-9 victory over the Raiders, ending a winless stretch that dated to March 18, 2009.

“We stuck through it, and I am so glad for my team,” said junior catcher Ron Wilson, a third-year player who was finally savoring his first victory. “In three years, we never made the plays that we made today.”

The Raiders (0-2) did not make it easy on them, playing an up-tempo and scrappy style of baseball that kept them in the affair until the final swings. Glades Central took an early 3-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning and came back to tie it at six apiece in the fifth inning.

But, as the Lakes’ team motto goes, “Rams never quit”.

Palm Beach Lakes scored three runs in the fifth inning and tacked on four more in the sixth to put the game away.

The Raiders’ Juan Gascon was 2-for-3 with two stolen bases and a run.

“They just refused to lose tonight,” Rams coach Dorwin Lynch said. “Nothing comes easy, but it feels really good.”

In the fifth, third baseman Samuel Gonzalez drew a leadoff walk, advanced on a single to the right-field gap by shortstop Dominique Hale and scored on a wild pitch. Left fielder Michael Elis followed with the game’s biggest hit when he crushed a delivery to deep right field for a standup-triple that plated Hale. Elis then scored on a passed ball.

Lakes scored the decisive runs during the sixth when Hale sent two across the plate on a fielder’s choice groundout, and Elis knocked in another with an RBI single. Elis finished the night 2-for-3 with two stolen bases, two runs and two RBI.

The Raiders did not go down easy, scoring runs in each of the last three innings to keep things close. Sophomore Gilberto Villarreal singled, stole second and scored amidst a three-run fifth. He also helped push two runs across in the sixth when his infield hit was overthrown to first base.

Villarreal also started the contest for the Raiders, throwing 124 pitches over five innings, registering 10 strikeouts while giving up nine walks.

“He still wanted to keep pitching,” Raiders coach Kenneth McDonald said. “He’s full of adrenaline and quite a competitor. We knew they were out for revenge on us, but we’re taking it in stride. We will see them two more times this year.”

The teams have continued to schedule games against one another over the years, as the young programs have continually played even contests that ultimately benefit both sides. Last season, the Raiders’ lone victory came at the hands of the Rams.

Righty Garrett Manning picked up the victory on the mound, after he recorded the final two outs to escape the Raiders’ rally in the fifth.

But it was starter Greg “Big Cat” Hester who did the majority of the work, going four and one-third innings on 99 pitches while recording nine strikeouts and issuing eight walks.

“We strive for best, not the less,” Hester said. “It all started with the pitching. I knew we had to start well. How ever it was in the beginning, I knew if we started good, we would end good.”

Hester threw 47 of his pitches for strikes, managing three scoreless innings, and he struck out the side after issuing a leadoff walk in the fourth inning.

The Raiders prepare to take on the Rams.

Hale finished 3-for-5 for the Rams, while Raiders’ catcher Juan Gascon was 2-for-3 with a pair of stolen bases and a run scored.

But the guy who recorded the most important out was Elis, who came in and notched the Rams’ final six outs to earn the save. The right-hander threw 21 of his 36 pitches for strikes and limited the Raiders damage in preserving the victory, finishing the night with a strikeout to cement the team’s big win.

“They really hung in there, and now they understand what it takes,” Lynch said. “We have a long way to go, and we know that, but this feels good.”

Before the season began, Lynch challenged this group to help be the ones to turn this program around. He sees this bunch as a more experienced unit, with more baseball awareness and savvy. The players are easier to coach and more aware as a team of what they are doing.

“It’s a hard sport, but they’re learning how to play. The game has slowed down for them a bit now,” Lynch said. “There were times when it would creep into my head and I would wonder if I was teaching them right, if I was coaching them right. I wondered if the team needed a new direction, if I was still the right man for them.”

Following Tuesday’s win, the Rams’ players answered that question, when they surprised their ball coach with a cold Gatorade shower to celebrate their victory.

As the players put it, they’d been waiting three years for that moment.

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