Erial Pounds Audubon, Forces Final Game for District 14 Title

Though the teams were wearing the same colors and the same players took the field Tuesday night, neither nor Audubon played anything like they did when the teams first met just three days earlier.

Erial had perhaps its best offensive game of the District 14 tournament, slugging six home runs while Audubon mustered just five hits of their own as Erial breezed to a 17-3 five-inning win, setting up a winner-take-all championship game for the district title tonight at Gloucester City Little League at 7 p.m.

“The one thing I told the kids was that wasn't us out there tonight,” Audubon assistant coach Tom Tassi said following Tuesday's game. “I told them to let it go. It doesn't matter if it's 2-1 or 17-3. We didn't come out to play today.”

Erial put up at least two runs in every inning and showcased its power against five different Audubon pitchers. In the first inning, after Cross Sarne led off with a walk, Adam Holland hit a two-run homer over the left-field fence to give Erial a 2-0 lead.

In the second inning, with Erial's lead cut to 3-2, Holland hit another home run, this one a solo shot to make it 4-2. The next batter, Jake Vespa, took the very next pitch out to left center for another home run, opening up a 5-2 Erial lead.

Audubon didn't help matters as they committed eight errors in the game. Three of those errors came in a third inning, when Erial had just two singles. However, with help of the three errors, Erial was able to put three more runs on the board in the inning. Five different Audubon infielders had errors at some point during the game.

“Our stars even had bad games tonight,” said Tassi. “That's not us. That's not who we are.”

Vespa got the start on the mound for Erial and gave his team three solid innings. He allowed three hits, two runs and three walks in the game while striking out three. All three batters who struck out against Vespa went down looking and two came at the end of the first inning when Audubon had a runner on third base.

Erial piled on eight more runs in the final two innings. Five of those runs were knocked in by Sean Sigall, who came in off the bench in the fourth inning. Sigall, who had not gotten a hit in the tournament coming into Tuesday's game, hit his way out of a slump in a hurry with two long home runs. His first home run in the fourth inning went over the 219-feet sign in center field. The ball hit off the scoreboard about 25 feet in the air, keeping the ball from landing even further away.

“The slump I came out of was pretty bad,” said Sigall, “so I was pretty happy when I hit it.”

Sigall also had a three-run homer in the fifth inning, a shot that extended Erial's lead to 15-3 at the time. Sarne followed Sigall with a enormous home run down the left field line that cleared the parking lot and landed on another field.

Erial simply looked ready to play from the first pitch of the game. They were extremely loose during the pre-game warmups and it carried onto the field.

“They were a lot more relaxed,” said Erial manager Carl Foltz. “They were goofing off before the game, just having fun and talking to each other. The other night, they seemed stiff and scared, to be honest, going into a big game.”

“Give Erial credit,” said Tassi. “They came out with conviction. They wanted to win more than we did, and it showed on the field.”

The two teams will now play one final time for the District 14 championship. The winner of tonight's game will advance to the Section 4 tournament, which is comprised of the six district champions from southern New Jersey.

Tassi expects Audubon to come back fighting tonight.

“We've been down before, but we have a great team,” said Tassi. “The beauty of this thing is that we earned the right to play again (tonight)— that's what was great about winning the other night. We've got to come in here (tonight) with the same kind of intensity that [Erial] did. We want to look like they did (tonight).”

For Erial, the team will go into tonight's game riding a two-game winning streak and coming off of a 17-run outburst.

When asked if his team now has the momentum going into tonight's game, Foltz very simply said, “Absolutely, no doubt.”

Be sure to check back later today for a complete photo gallery from Tuesday's game.