Surging Canton A’s climb into 2nd place

After playing .500 baseball through the first 14 games of the season, the Canton A’s put together a four-game winning streak last week with two wins apiece against Easton and Kingston to improve their record to 11-7.

The A’s now find themselves in second place in the Cranberry League at the halfway point of the season, trailing only Braintree, which is undefeated at 17-0.

With the team getting quality starting pitching, timely hitting, and contributions from many players, including several of the newer players, A’s head coach Kee Arguimbau is quite excited about the potential of his team going forward.

The A’s only loss last week came against Weymouth 6-5 on Tuesday, but they followed that up with back-to-back shutout wins over Easton, 6-0 and 5-0, and a doubleheader sweep of Kingston Sunday at CHS, 4-3 and 6-4.

In the first game against Easton on Thursday, A’s pitcher Jared Clement hurled a four-hit shutout and was honored as the Cranberry League Pitcher of the Week. The A’s also played errorless ball against the Huskies, led by shortstop Andrew Vandini with 10 putouts.

Offensively, Nick Radcliffe and Joe Belmosto each had two hits and two RBIs. The A’s played Easton again on Saturday and Sharon’s Dave Roberto took a no-hitter into the seventh inning. He did give up a hit, completing the game with four strikeouts and no walks. Canton got key hits from Chuck LaPaglia, Chris Nadeau, Radcliffe, and Kevin O’Sullivan. Vandini also played another great defensive game at shortstop.

In the first game of the Sunday doubleheader, Canton scored the winning run in the bottom of the seventh on an error by Kingston. The winning pitcher was Zack Walker, who had one tough inning — allowing three unearned runs on two errors — before shutting down the Pirates the rest of the way, giving up no hits while striking out five. Sean O’Neil, Vandini and O’Sullivan had key hits and RBIs for the A’s.

In the second game against Kingston, Jared Kuzio came on in relief of Radcliffe and pitched three scoreless innings as the A’s bats came alive to win the game. Doubles by Belmosto, Steve Delanian, and O’Neil paced the attack.

“We are playing great baseball right now,” said Arguimbau. “Vandini is playing great at shortstop, we have six quality starters (Walker, Clement, Roberto, Kuzio, Radcliffe, and Tim Bonham) and good depth, including Cory Albanese, who is a very versatile player for me, playing right field, second, and third.”

Both Arguimbau and general manager Cab Devoll would like to thank Canton residents Fred and Reggie Spintig for their longtime support of the team.

The A’s next play on Tuesday, July 9, against Rockland at 6 p.m. at CHS, followed by an away game Thursday, July 11, against Weymouth at Norwell High.

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Posted by Mike Berger on Jul 3 2013. Filed under Beyond CHS, Sports. Both comments and pings are currently closed.