Tigers Baseball Cracks Win Column With 4-0 Victory Over Middletown

TIVERTON—A little home cooking always helps the soul. Not to mention the win column.

After losing five straight road games to start the 2011 season, the baseball team made its home debut Tuesday morning with a bang, blanking Middletown High School, 4-0, in a crisply-played Division I-South game which consumed less than two hours.

Right-handed senior Mike Perella scattered five hits in a complete-game performance and sophomore Andrew Bonoan collected three hits at the plate as the Tigers scratched out single scores in the second and third innings along with two runs in the sixth chapter to upset the Islanders, who dropped to 3-3 in league play and 3-4 overall.

“It’s nice to get that first win out of the way and I was very pleased with the way we played today,” said Tiverton Coach Carl Reid. “We had more energy today with a lot of focus, and carried it over into the game.”

Perella (whom Reid said pitched “a gem”) was especially effective, mixing pitch speed and locations to keep Middletown’s batters off balance, and successfully worked out of three jams to earn a shutout. He walked three batters and struck out three and benefited from a stellar defensive performance by his teammates.

“Mike mixed his pitches well, changed speed and got ahead of people,” Reid said. “I thought he did a great job.”

“Middletown has a good team and I was just mixing it up, throwing curveballs and cutters,” Perella said. “I was just trying to keep them off balance.”

The Tigers managed just seven hits against Middletown right-hander Matt Sullivan, who also threw well while passing one and fanning two.

After Perella escaped a two-on, one out jam in the top of the second inning, Tiverton produced its first tally in the bottom half of the same frame when Ryan Czajka (two hits) singled, advanced to second on a wild pitch and scored on Andrew Murray’s looping single to center field with two outs. The Tigers doubled their margin to 2-0 in the fourth inning when Bonoan singled, stole second, raced to third on an error and sprinted home on Jake Kapstein’s sacrifice fly to right field.

The Islanders threatened again in the fifth inning when Perella walked Joe Sanfilipo and Cam Eggeman starting the inning, but bore down to whiff Justin Sellar, induce Dylan Gracia to fly out to right fielder Derrick Paquette and retire Dylan Atibagos on a bouncer back to the mound.

“That was a tough spot in the game, but Mike threw the ball well and got out of a tight spot,” Reid said.

Mark Powell’s lead-off single in the sixth chapter went for naught when Perella influenced Armand Rugel to rap into a 6-4-3 double play. Later in the frame, Middletown put two runners on base with two outs before Perella got Sanfilipo to ground out to Bonoan at second base.

Tiverton added a couple of insurance runs in the home half of the sixth inning when pinch-runner Taylor Ekstrom counted on Mitch Hartnett’s fielder’s choice and Bonoan beat out an infield single to plate pinch-runner Alex Bodington. Perella yielded a two-out bunt single to Gracia in the seventh inning before retiring Atibagos on an infield grounder to end the game.