AUGUSTA — It took near flawless baseball to end the Cony baseball team’s season.
However, defending Class B champ Ellsworth did just that in a 7-1 thumping of the second-seeded Rams in a Class B North semifinal game Saturday at Morton Field.
Ellsworth (14-4) will play No. 1 Old Town (15-3) in the regional final. Cony finished 16-2.
Kam Douin cracked a 300-foot home run over the right field fence in the first inning for Cony, but it proved to be the only run the Rams could muster as Ellsworth starter Dawson Curtis came up big. He allowed a run on three hits – all in the first inning – before pitching six near-perfect innings. He struck out eight batters and walked one.
“It feels amazing (to win),” Curtis said. “This year, we’re a little down because we’re young, but we just kind of put that on our shoulder, go out there and chip. We knew how good we were, and we knew we could get to the (regional final).”
The Ellsworth offense proved a nightmare for Cony starter Landon Foster. The Eagles jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the first inning. Dawson helped his own cause, cracking a two-run double, while Camden Barker added an RBI single. After Cony scored its lone run in the bottom of the inning, the Eagles responded by adding another run in the second. Jordan Benedict relieved Foster early in the second inning.
“We really didn’t hit well in the quarterfinals,” Ellsworth head coach Dan Curtis said. “You’ve got that week layover (from the regular season) and I think it was good to just get out and play. We obviously showed a little bit today. We hit fairly well, then we kind of cooled off. But we’re ready.”
Cony pitcher Landon Foster fires a pitch during a Class B North semifinal game Saturday at Morton Field in Augusta. Joe Phelan/Kennebec Journal
“Ellsworth just came out swinging,” Cony head coach Don Plourde added. “They had three hits in their previous game, they more than that in the first inning. Tip your cap, they squared up a lot of balls, found a lot of gaps. I don’t know how many two-strike fouls they had, but they’re the best hitting team we’ve seen this year, by far.”
Benedict did well in relief, striking out four in six innings of work while allowing just three hits. Ellsworth added two more runs in the fourth inning, thanks to a two-run single by Peter Keblinsky.
That was more than enough for the lefty Dawson Curtis, who was able to hit spots on both corners of the plate with his fastball.
“That was a really good hit by (Douin), that thing was crushed,” Curtis said. “I just trusted (myself) to throw strikes and I trusted my fielders and they did really good today. Everyone on the team did really good today.”
Cony had its 12-game winning streak snapped.
“We grinded every day, starting in March,” Plourde said. “We were getting ready to play nexts week. The guys believed in each other. But what are you going to do?”
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