South baseball only Williamsville school alive
by PATRICK J. NAGY Reporter

Williamsville South lost once to Williamsville North and twice to Williamsville East during the regular season but surprisingly is the only Williamsville baseball team left in the Section VI Tournament.

The Billies, seeded eighth in the Class A tournament, routed ninth-seed Kenmore East, 18-3, in a home prequarterfinal game on Friday, May 25. East, seeded first in Class A and North, seeded first in Class AA, each lost their opening round games.

South hosted 16th-seed Lewiston-Porter on Tuesday, May 29 but the result was unavailable before The Bee went to press. If South wins, they would host a semifinal game at 5 p.m. on Thursday, May 31. The final is 4 p.m., Saturday, June 2 at Diethrick Park in Jamestown.

The Billies scored four runs in the first inning against Kenmore East and added eight runs in the third and another four in the sixth. Dan Lynch went 3 for 4 with two RBIs and scored three runs. Shane Hurley hit 3 for 3 with four RBIs. Greg Reed was 2 for 3 with three RBIs. Frank Pieri hit 2 for 4 with two RBIs, scored four runs and on the mound, gave up three runs, two earned, two hits, and struck out four in four innings. Lynch allowed no runs and hits and struck out three over the final three innings.

"The wrap on us all season was that we couldn't put anything together offensively," said South coach Dave Delisanti. "We always joked that we would put it all together at sectionals and for one game we did."

"It was our best hitting game of the year by far," added South coach Brian Hansen. "To plate 18 runs you have to be hitting the ball pretty good. We came out strong at the beginning and set Ken East back mentally. And we played very well defensively. We only committed one mistake and it didn't hurt us."

In non-league action earlier in the week, South lost at Newfane, 3-0, on Monday, May 21 and home against Maryvale, 10-7, on Tuesday, May 22.

Against Newfane, Pieri allowed three hits in the first inning, including a one-out double with the bases loaded, and combined with Lynch and Scott Steimer for 13 strikeouts and four hits the rest of the game. South's offense was held to singles by Reed, Alex Walkowski, and Joe Ziemecki.

The Maryvale game marked the first time Hansen had coached against his son, Kurt. Kurt Hansen replaced Bob Kowal, who took over head coaching duties at Lake Shore. Brian's other son, Keith, is an assistant at South.

"It was very exciting," said Brian Hansen. "A lot of things that (Kurt) says (to his players) are very familiar to what I say… But his team was the better team on that day. Their hitting was far better than ours and we committed a lot of errors."

South scored three runs in the second (Hurley on Austin White single; Pieri on Chris Couche sacrifice fly, White on Shawn Mooney double). Steimer singled in Hurley and P.J. Coppola in the seventh.

South got solid pitching from Matt Minervini (three earned runs) and Darren Powers (unearned run, two strikeouts). Pieri had a single and double at the plate.

Brian Hansen would have the last laugh as Maryvale lost 7-2 against West Seneca East in a prequarterfinal game.

e-mail: pnagy@beenews.com