Sports

Boys Baseball Falls Short in CNEPSBL Semifinals Against Dexter Southfield

Andover Boys Baseball competed in the Central New England Prep School Baseball League (CNEPSBL) Semifinals on May 21. The team fell short to Dexter Southfield (Dexter) 1-11. 

Pitcher Marek Krystofolski ’25 described the team’s preparation going into the game. While the pitchers were catering their training to the Dexter and Worcester Academy (Worcester) lineups, the rest of the team was working on perfecting its game, connecting as a team, and going in with a positive mindset. 

“I know the pitchers were especially focused on the Dexter and Worcester lineups. We were anticipating those were the games we were going to play, so we knew they were going to be tough hitters and we were going to have to pitch in big spots, so working on a lot of our off speed in the bullpen, working on stand-ins. From the whole team aspect, we were working on just being quick to the ball, playing as a team, making as little mistakes as we could, and preparing our mindset for the game,” said Krystofolski. 

Co-Captain Andrew DeBenedictis ’23 mentioned some areas where the team could improve offensively. In terms of defense, he shared that Dexter’s offense was strong and ended up overpowering Andover’s defense.

DeBenedictis said, “Offensively, I feel like we had a handful of base runners, there were a lot of missed opportunities. I think a lot of runners weren’t in scoring position. We just couldn’t really execute and cash in, and then defensively, I mean, Dexter’s offense was just really high power that day, and they were hitting everything our pitcher was throwing. It wasn’t like we were making errors. It was more just them getting the hits.”

Robert Brown ’25 noted that although the team was losing in the second half of the game, the energy of the team didn’t falter. With a history of some significant comebacks, it was able to stay positive until the end of the game. 

“Despite being down for the second half of the game the team never got flat. We stayed up and yelling through all seven innings. We have had some big comebacks throughout the season and that definitely helped us keep energy up through the game,” said Brown in an email to The Phillipian

The team was able to score a run early on in the game. DeBenedictis noted that the impressive performance from the hitters gave the team a boost of energy. 

“The one run we did score was a really, really great run. It was back to back, I believe, doubles by our three and four hitters. So that was really energetic,” said DeBenedictis. 

While the team was able to use each other for support early on in the game, the team struggled to hold onto that. According to Krystofolski, Dexter recognized the lack of unity and ability to work together and used it to its advantage. 

“I think in the early innings we really were playing off each other, which is good. It just happened in the later innings where we could have used a little more of that and that’s where they caught us on our heels,” said Krystofolski.

Looking forward to the Andover/Exeter game, the team hopes to shift its mindset and focus solely on Phillips Exeter Academy. DeBenidictis shared that the team is now honing in on small details and things that it can control to prepare for the rivalry. 

“I would just say flushing this out of our memory. Now, we gotta shift our focus to our rivalry. I guess just focus on the little things. Take care of the controllables for Saturday,” said DeBenedictis. 

Andover Boys Baseball will play Exeter on Saturday at 2:00 p.m.