On Wednesday, Eric Wlasiuk was a victim of a hit-and-run when an MTA bus struck the car the Xaverian senior pitcher was traveling in and continued along Avenue U without stopping.
A day later, the top-seeded Clippers kept their season alive thanks to a perfectly executed hit-and-run by Elvin Soto as Xaverian defeated No. 5 Bishop Ford, 4-3 in eight innings, in a CHSAA Class A intersectional playoff game at Kaiser Stadium on the campus of St. John’s University.
The Clippers advance in the losers bracket to face No. 3 St. Raymond on Friday afternoon back at Kaiser Stadium.
Wlasiuk never made it to St. John’s to watch his team get upset by Xavier Wednesday night. He was left to fill out a police report in Brooklyn.
“Everyone is fine, there’s no injuries,” Wlasiuk said. “It’s just that the guy hit me and left. I couldn’t do anything.”
The right-hander did plenty Thursday. He stayed away from his change-up and couldn’t throw his curveball for strikes early, but his fastball was on all game and that was good enough. Wlasiuk allowed two earned runs on five hits, striking out six with two walks in seven innings.
“Eric pitched his heart out,” Xaverian coach Lou Piccola said. “He wanted to stay, but when we saw he was up to 120 [pitches], he threw enough. It’s a game of inches and we got lucky.”
For a while it looked like the two runs Bishop Ford (15-7) scratched across in the first and third would hold up. Stephen Bove drove in Jonathan Pineiro with a single to center in the first and Anthony Foust was hit by a curveball with the bases loaded in the third.
Falcons left-hander Miguel Ariza gave up just three hits through five innings. He picked off a pair of runners in the first and twice Ford, which split a pair of regular-season games with the Clippers, turned double plays behind him.
Xaverian (19-2) didn’t match its Brooklyn rival’s intensity until the sixth inning when Ariza walked Antonio Nunez and J.T. Torres. Ariza was pulled for Nelson Lopez, who promptly gave up a game-tying, two-run double to center by third baseman Kevin Martir.
“That was something huge,” Wlasiuk said. “It was a key hit in a key situation. … That was amazing.”
It was the hit the Clippers so desperately needed.
“[We] were down until that big hit,” Xaverian catcher Elvin Soto said. “It picked all of us up.”
Lopez hit Torres with a pitch to open the eighth and Ford coach Mike Hanrahan brought in lefty Helbert Estevez. Martir sacrificed Torres to second, bringing up Soto. The switch-hitting junior had a critical error against Xavier and was 0-for-3 at the plate against Ford. But he went the other way with a single to right as Torres broke for third. The Iona-bound center fielder came around to score easily to cap Xaverian’s stirring come-from-behind win.
“Today the last at-bat was big,” Soto said. “Hopefully I just break through and come back tomorrow as my old self.”
The victory was huge and could be the spark the Clippers needed. But Piccola is wary of a strong St. Raymond squad. The Ravens will send left-hander James Santiago to the hill, likely against Clippers junior Steven Pastrana, who hasn’t pitched in more than a month because of a back injury.
“We came back, we’re happy today, but we have to carry this energy to tomorrow,” Piccola said. “It’s a long road. Nothing is impossible. We realize what we have to do, but we can’t let teams take early leads and get late in the game and come back. We’ve done that a lot in the season and we’re not going to happen in the playoffs. There are too many good pitchers out there to shut us down.”
