Chris Hohlstein ’14 belted his second home run of the year and smashed a triple in Andover Baseball’s 8-4 victory against Brooks on Monday.
“I’ve been working on staying inside the ball in practice because I felt like I was early on the balls in games. That work in practice has translated into more power because I’ve got better timing,” said Hohlstein.
Against Brooks on Monday, Tim Salvadore ’15 started on the mound and pitched three innings, allowing only one run.
After a scoreless first inning, Andover’s offense lit up in the bottom of the second and took a 2-0 lead, as Seamus O’Neill ’13 hit a sacrifice fly to bring home Dan Dymecki ’12.
Brooks was able to cut the deficit in half in the third inning, as a runner reached home off of a fielder’s choice.
Andover took a 3-1 lead in the third inning, but Brooks answered in the fourth, scoring one off of pitcher Thomas Lane ’15 with a sacrifice bunt.
In the bottom of the inning, Andover responded by getting two runners into scoring position. Hohlstein took the plate and cranked a deep triple to bring home both runners and make the score 5-2.
Curtiss Pomeroy ’12 then hit an RBI double later in the inning to make the lead 6-2.
Although Brooks managed to put two runs on the board and cut Andover’s lead to one when Derek Farquhar ’12 came in to relieve Lane in the top of the sixth inning, Andover brought home two runs in the bottom of the sixth to increase the lead to 8-4.
Pomeroy replaced Farquhar in the seventh inning and closed out the game without allowing a single hit.
Earlier in the week, in a doubleheader against Northfield Mount Hermon (NMH), Andover had two great pitching outings from Rory Ziomek ’13 and Dymecki, as both threw shutout games and recorded a combined 16 strikeouts. Andover triumphed over NMH 14-0 in the first game and 7-0 in the second.
Against NMH, Dymecki started the first game of the doubleheader, tallying nine strikeouts and allowing only three hits.
“I had a lot of pop on my fastball. I threw each pitch with conviction and got a lot of players to swing through my off-speed stuff,” said Dymecki.
Ziomek pitched the second game of the double header and threw six innings, striking out seven and allowing six hits.
Andover’s offense exploded throughout the entire game with 14 runs and RBIs from all areas of the lineup.
“We are just flat out mashing the ball. We have kept our strikeouts to a minimum and are putting the ball hard in play, which forces our opponents to make plays,” said Dymecki.
Dymecki contributed three RBIs of his own throughout the day.
“We’re putting it together and jumping on teams early and not letting up,” said Hohlstein.
Andover hopes to continue its remarkable offense and defense in a doubleheader against Exeter tomorrow.
