Wild 10th sends Hagerty to final 4; Bishop Moore, Orangewood also clinch | State baseball

OVIEDO — It seems quite odd that a 10-inning pitchers’ duel with a berth in the state semifinals on the line would end up a 14-4 final score. But that’s what happened at Hagerty High School on Saturday afternoon.

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Relief pitchers Nick Stentiford of Hagerty, who entered in the third inning, and Lukas Stirewalt of West Orange, who entered in the fifth, were impressive. Stentiford struck out seven in his seven innings of work, while Stirewalt struck out 10 in five innings, including eight in a row.

But Stirewalt seemed to tire in the 10th inning and the Hagerty bats came alive. Hagerty batted around against three different West Orange pitchers and before the bleeding was stopped, the Huskies had plated 10 runs in a crazy inning.

The 14-4 victory in the Class 7A Region 1 final sends Hagerty to the state final four for the second consecutive year. The Huskies improved to 22-8 and will try to take the next step after falling to Jupiter in last year’s state semifinal. West Orange finishes the season 20-13.

Bishop Moore in Class 4A and Orangewood Christian in Class 1A also clinched spots in the state final four in Fort Myers. Orangewood opens play Thursday, Hagerty will play Friday and Bishop Moore will play May 19. Winter Springs was facing a deciding Game 3 on Sunday afternoon at home against Wesley Chapel in 5A.

“That is what they like to do to me,” said Hagerty coach Mike Sindone, whose Huskies swept the best-of-three series with two wins. “They love to say, ‘Awe we’re just gonna play some extra innings in this playoff series.’ They like to do it. They’ve done it all postseason. They kind of expected to have a little fun with me today, toy with my emotions, but they did a good job.”

Stentiford, a junior, gave his coach enough quality innings to keep him sane on the bench.

“It was a great team win. We stayed together ’til the end,” Stentiford said. “We hit when we needed it most and the big guys came up in big spots and did what we needed to.”

Stentiford was steady in his seven innings, limiting the Warriors to just one hit after picking up for starter Noah Adkins.

“The more level-headed I am, the better my command is,” Stentiford said. “If I can’t command my pitches, there was no chance we would have stayed in it. I had a job to do so I did it.”

In that 10th, Stirewalt walked the first two batters and Hagerty’s best hitter approached the plate, big left-handed slugger Isaias Torres. Sindone made an interesting decision. He had Torres, a sophomore, bunt to move both the runners into scoring position. Torres laid down a perfect sacrifice dribbler, job done.

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Torres didn’t mind laying down the bunt.

“Hey, we scored three runs so I don’t care,” Torres said.

“We basically tell everybody, ‘I don’t care where you are in the lineup, you need to be able to bunt and move a runner over,” Sindone said. “We really wanted a productive AB so it’s, ‘Hey man, put a bunt down and get him over in scoring and see what happens.’ He did his job.”

West Orange intentionally walked the next batter, Aiden Kearney, to load the bases. That brought Shaurya Bhosale to the plate. The sophomore third baseman answered the call, blasting a double to the fence in left-center field to clear the bases.

“I just had to get the ball deep enough in the outfield to score a run. I wanted to put the team up by one at least,” Bhosale said. “I ended up getting a good pitch to hit and I just hit it.”

The damage was done, but Hagerty wasn’t finished. The Huskies loaded the bases again, and senior Jalin Copeland blasted a towering grand slam to left-center field. Two batters later, Torres was back at the plate. No bunt sign this time. Torres launched a shot in nearly the identical spot as Copeland for a two-run homer and Hagerty was on its way to Fort Myers.

Brendan Beldowicz came on in the 10th to get the save.

It was Stentiford who allowed the Huskies to get to that 10th inning.

“He did a really good job. Nick Stentiford has come in in so many major spots for us this year,” Sindone said. “He’s built for it. He did it last year. He’s done it this year in almost every single game our starter couldn’t finish. He understands his job and he throws every pitch we call with full conviction.”

Region results

In other area action Saturday, Winter Springs was looking to send Wesley Chapel packing after winning the first game of their 5A Region 2 series Friday night. The Bears, however, gave up 12 runs to Wesley Chapel on Saturday and lost  12-2. They are facing off in a Game 3 that was postponed until Sunday at 2:30 p.m.

In 6A Region 2, Lake Minneola won Friday night, but was swept Saturday by Martin County in a high-scoring doubleheader. Martin won 10-4 and 16-4.

In 4A Region 2, Bishop Moore swept Eustis in two games and will be headed to Fort Myers. Danny Garcia had a home run, double and four RBI for Bishop Moore (29-2) in the series-clinching win. Tony Castro was on the mound, striking out three in 4.1 innings.

In 2A Region 2, Lakeland Christian stole the series away from The First Academy after TFA won the opener 11-6. Lakeland Christian won a 13-7 decision on Saturday, and then sent the defending 2A state champs home Saturday night with a 7-5 victory.

In 1A Region 2, Orangewood Christian, in a region final rematch with Mount Dora Christian from last year, swept the Bulldogs with 3-2 and 12-4 victories. Orangewood returns to Fort Myers for the final four for the second straight season. Max Sakala (11-2) and Rhys Oldham (10-2) were the winning pitchers for the Rams. Addison Lambert was 3-for-4 with a RBI and Tre Roach was 2-for-3 and scored three runs.

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Chris Hays can be found on X.com @OS_ChrisHays.