It is no surprise that Essex has booked a trip in the Division I Title game on Friday night. Many looked at Essex as the team to beat after watching them play despite being handed the #2 seed due to the VPA Ranking system. What many didn’t expect is to see the Bobwhites from BFA St. Albans one win away from being a Vermont Baseball State Champion in 2010. In fact, looking back at my Division I Bracket Prediction, I had the Bobwhites losing in the first round (shows how much I know). What many have found out in the past couple of weeks is that the Bobwhites aren’t afraid of anyone and are ready to play come Friday evening. “Not many people have expected us to make it as far as we have so we are playing with nothing to lose,” BFA junior Sean Connor said about the Bobwhites Cinderella run.
Since knocking off Essex in the regular season 17-13 in a game they were behind 8-1 and eventually 13-9 in the 7th inning, BFA has had the mentality that they can beat anybody. “Since that Essex win a few weeks back we have been ‘Giant Killers,” Connor added. Bobwhite first basemen Kyle Thweatt definitely thinks the team has used that victory over Essex as a barometer to show that they can play with anyone. “It definitely gave us confidence. We know that we beat one of, if not the best team in the state after coming back from the deficit that we did. It tells us that we can match up with anyone and having beat them already we can go in knowing we can beat them,” Thweatt said.
The Bobwhites will have to travel to the Montpelier Recreation Field on Friday night at 7:30, which will not be anything new as they have beaten all higher seeded teams on the road during their playoff run. BFA has showed grit and unity during the tournament coming together during pressure situations on their journey to the Championship. The Bobwhites came back from a late deficit in their opening round game at Colchester to steal a 4-3 win on the road. BFA then had to travel over three hours to face top seeded Mt. Anthony where they dispatched the Patriots handily in a 10-7 victory. With that win, the Bobwhites earned a second three hour road trip to Brattleboro two days later, where they would come from behind again, erasing a 5-1 deficit, while winning 9-8 in 10 innings. Connor, who delivered the game winner in the tenth inning discredits his individual effort when describing what has pulled the Bobwhites through, “It wasn’t my hit that won the game (Brattleboro). Our team showed its true colors last game because every person contributed in their own way. No one gave up when things didn’t go our way and thats why we won. We have been on the road this entire postseason, and our momentum as a team is what will give us a shot to win.”
The Bobwhites will have a tall task ahead of them knocking off Essex for a second time. Essex, who will be the home team at Montpelier carrying the higher seed will have access to their two star pitchers (Aaron Plunkett and Adam Picard) who at season’s end plan to attend and play Division 1 Baseball at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Plunkett started against Rice in the semi-final but was removed 69 pitches into his outing to keep him eligible to pitch this Friday. Picard who earned the win against Rice and finished the game will also be eligible to pitch. Picard, who is no stranger to a Division I Championship game (winning in 2008 with an 8-3 win vs. Hartford) feels little pressure going into Friday. “We’re just going to think of it as any other game, cause that’s all it is. We just need to play like we have all year and we’ll be fine,” Picard said after the Hornets semi-final win vs. Rice.
The Hornets are taking the, “just another game approach” this year even with the fact that the team on the other side of the diamond knocked them off earlier in the season. “We can’t wait for another chance to face them I guess. Really though, we just want to win, especially us guys who are seniors and will play our last game for Essex (on Friday). It doesn’t matter who we play,” added Picard. Picard’s teammate Dylan Begin, who will team up with him and Plunkett at UMass Amherst next season reiterated this mindset. “I mean…you always would like to beat teams you lost to previously, but what motivates most of us is knowing that there is no tomorrow, especially for us seniors where we only have one chance left to win,” Begin added.
If the Hornets want to win this go round against BFA, they will have to limit mistakes. In the Hornets earlier game this season which they lost 17-13 at home, Essex blew leads of 8-1, 10-3, 12-7, and 13-9 after a combination of timely hitting on the part of the Bobwhites and poor pitching and errors by Essex. “We need to limit the extra outs that we give them as well as execute the way we have practiced all year long. We know they can hit the ball well. If we give them confidence we know they can hurt us. The big thing for us is making the easy plays and keeping them off the bases,” Begin remarked as some of the Hornets keys to the game.
In addition to what surrounds the Hornets on the field, there is also an off field storyline that has developed from this championship bout. Essex Head Coach Steve Ferreira announced at the beginning of the year that this, the 43rd season of his career, would be his last as he will retire at seasons end. With the Hornets in the title game, this will be Ferreira’s last game in an Essex uniform. “We would like nothing more then to win it for him in his last year. He’s helped all of us in so many ways and getting him one more title before he goes would be special,” Begin said, appreciative of his coach’s efforts throughout the years. In Ferreira’s 43 years at the helm, the berth into the 2010 title game is his 10th overall and if he wins it will be his 5th Vermont Division1 State Championship.
With all of the plots and story lines of this much anticipated Vermont Division 1 Baseball Championship off the field, there is still a baseball game to be played come Friday night under the bright lights of Montpelier Recreation Field. The game begins at 7:30pm as we will see the 9th seeded BFA St. Albans Bobwhites (12-7) face the 2nd seeded Essex Hornets (18-2).