Rivera, Garcia Key John I. Leonard Victory Over Santaluces

With a double, two walks,and a stolen base on Monday night, junior shortstop Jorge Rivera was vital in John I. Leonard's 6-3 victory over Santaluces.

It may have been chilly on Monday night in South Beach, but Jorge Rivera gave the Lancers some much-needed fire when they needed it most. John I. Leonard shortstop Jorge Rivera had a key two-run double and the team displayed fantastic patience at the plate as the Lancers downed Santaluces 5-3 for their first victory of the year.

As temperatures hovered near the low 60’s for most of the game the bats were cool and it was a competitive pitchers’ duel. That made Rivera’s big hit even more important, as the junior matched his double output from last year in just one at-bat.

“It felt great and I definitely got the right pitch to hit,” Rivera said. “I was fortunate to take advantage of that pitch and I’m glad I was able to help the team win.”

Lancers manager Doug Magaw said it was a welcome sight to see Rivera succeed from the nine-hole. The team had Rivera in that slot in the order to serve as another leadoff role to help turn the lineup over. The club’s starting shortstop did just that.

“That’s exactly why he’s there,” Magaw said. “No doubt about that and that’s exactly why he’s there. He was able to rebound from the missed squeeze attempt and stayed in the moment rather than saying, ‘well, I just blew the squeeze so I may as well give up on this at-bat’, and we expect that from all of our guys. I’m very happy.”

Rivera, along with left fielder Geraldo Soriano, walked twice and forced Santaluces’ staff to throw pitch after pitch in their at-bats.

“We were just trying to stay focused and swing at good pitches and I’m glad that we never strayed away from that philosophy,” Magaw said of an offense that drew a total of six walks on Monday night. “We stayed right there on that and I think it really paid off for us.”

Garcia, who didn’t pitch last year for the Lancers, threw four solid innings and worked out of jams as he dueled Chiefs right-handed junior Malik Lissone. Lissone also threw four innings and struck out three.

Sophomore infielder Justin Anglin recorded two hits for the Lancers.

“I’m pretty pleased — it’s pretty disappointing that we got the loss when Malik was pitching because he’s going to be counted on to pitch a lot of big innings for us,” Chiefs manager Nick Franco said. “It was a good start though. He threw four innings and I really liked what I saw from him tonight.”

Santaluces had several opportunities to score and take the lead throughout the game. The most notable was a failed suicide-squeeze opportunity in the bottom of the third inning; with first and third and only one out, a missed suicide-squeeze resulted in sophomore Justin Anglin being tagged out between third and home plate.

“We battled, but we came up short,” Franco said. “We didn’t execute a squeeze in the third inning, and that may have changed the game if we score that first run of the third inning to break it open.”

Of note for Franco’s squad on offense was sophomore Andrew Johnson, who drove in two of the team’s three runs with an RBI single in the fourth. Anglin also had two hits on the night.

Though the Lancers had their moments early on, it wasn’t until the sixth inning that the shift in momentum really began. After junior third baseman Michel Cuellar was hit by a pitch, Garcia drew a walk and senior Kyle Lamb reached base by way of error. Cuellar then came around to score on a wild pitch.

Rivera drew his second walk of the night and sophomore center fielder Daniel Hernandez recorded his own RBI by way of a base-on-balls. When all was said and done in the sixth, the Lancers had scored two runs and got five men on base all without recording a single hit.

Santaluces scored a run in the sixth inning to lower the deficit, and sophomore pitcher Orlando Hernandez worked out of trouble in the final inning to record his first save of the season

Leave a comment using your facebook account!