No-hitter for Commack, but no state Class AA baseball title
Ryan Krzemienski of Commack during the state class AA baseball championship game on Saturday, June 10, 2023 at Binghamton. Credit: JORGE MARCANO
BINGHAMTON — The final play of the Commack baseball season came on a scorched grounder toward shortstop.
With the tying and go-ahead runs on second and third and two outs, lefthanded-hitting Cougars second baseman Adam Gonzalez slashed an 87-mph fastball the other way.
On a day in which Commack threw a no-hitter in the state championship game and still lost, this play didn’t go the Cougars’ way either.
The ball came within inches of taking out the field umpire but he hopped out of harm’s way, and the ball found the surehanded glove of Roy C. Ketcham shortstop Owen Paino.
With an enormous Commack contingent in full throat, Paino fired across the diamond to beat the sprinting Gonzalez — and Roy C. Ketcham edged Commack, 2-1, to capture the state Class AA baseball championship Saturday at Mirabito Stadium.
“Our infield has played great defense all season,” Roy C. Ketcham coach Pat Mealy said. “We have a special middle infield that makes all the plays.”
Commack pitchers Sebastian LoCurto, Chris Messina and Ryan Krzemienski combined to hold Section I champion Roy C. Ketcham hitless.
That’s right. The Cougars lost despite throwing a no-hitter in the state championship game.
“This was a crushing loss,” Commack coach Matt Salmon said. “We threw a no-hitter and lost in the state championship. Our pitching shut them down.”
The problem was that Commack had only three hits itself.
“We ran into a buzzsaw in [Riley] Weatherwax,” Salmon said. “He stayed ahead of our hitters and pounded the zone. And when he needed it, his defense played great. We barreled a few balls on him and they were hit right at people. He was the best pitcher we saw all year.”
Weatherwax and teammate Ryan Mealy both finished 9-0 this season with ERAs under 1.00.
Commack (25-3), which averaged 13 runs per game, could do little against Weatherwax. He scattered three hits, walked three, hit a batter and struck out seven in a 103-pitch complete game.
“I knew they were one of the best-hitting teams in the state,” Weatherwax said. “My defense made some great plays. I tried to stay ahead in the count and keep them uncomfortable. It’s the toughest lineup I’ve seen. I watched them crush a team in the semifinals and the Commack hitters never got cheated on their swings.”
It was Ketcham’s second state title, with the first coming in 2005.
Commack took a 1-0 lead with one out in the second inning. Evan Kay hit an opposite-field double down the rightfield line, and after Matt Mayer popped out, Krzemienski grounded an RBI single on a 1-and-2 pitch.
Roy C. Ketcham (28-2) scored two unearned runs in the third inning for the 2-1 lead.
LoCurto was removed after walking Mike Schiavone, leaving after 45 pitches.
After Messina got the first out, he walked Paino and an infield error on Connor Durkin’s hard grounder tied the score at 1.
Paino moved to third on a wild pitch just before Tyler Durkin lined a ball up the middle that caromed off the cleat of Messina and ricocheted toward Gonzalez at second base. He hustled to the ball and threw to first to get the second out, but Paino scored for the 2-1 lead.
From there it was all pitching and defense.
Krzemienski retired all nine batters through three innings and got help from leftfielder Dean Vincent, who made a spectacular diving catch in the fourth.
Meanwhile, Weatherwax benefited from a fourth-inning double play and a running catch by Schiavone in leftfield on Chris McHugh’s long blast in the sixth.
In the seventh, Kay walked and Krzemienski had a one-out single. Alex Hildebrand drilled a grounder down the first-base line that was backhanded by Ryan Mealy for the second out as the runners advanced into scoring position, bringing up Gonzalez.
Ultimately, in going further than any team in their storied baseball history, the Cougars remained alive down to the final pitch.
Between the high schools at North and South and then as a combined team, the Commack baseball program has won 33 league titles (including the last six in a row), nine Suffolk crowns and four Long Island championships since 1965. What has eluded Commack, one of Long Island’s hot spots for baseball, is a state crown.
“This game will motivate all of us for next season,” Krzemienski said. “We were so close. We’ll look forward to coming back to win that state title next year.”
Gregg Sarra is Newsday's high school sports editor and has been on the beat since the mid-1980s.
