CONCORD – On a night when Concord High baseball honored its massive 11-player senior class, it was only fitting that one of them would help the Tide get the last laugh against Spaulding on Friday.
Armen Laylagian, the 6-foot-tall right-handed hitter, came to bat with the bases loaded in a 5-5 tie in the bottom of the seventh inning. He hit what should’ve been an inning-ending ground ball to second, but it was booted. Run scored. The Tide won, 6-5.
Concord didn’t make things easy – the Tide committed five errors in the field. But Spaulding committed five as well, ultimately leading to the walk-off.
“We’re coming to fight. We’re coming to win,” said Laylagian after the game. “It doesn’t matter if we’re going to get beat up along the way. We’re going to take a punch, and we’re going to roll with it, and we’re going to come back swinging.”
Against Spaulding – a team that’s now 4-13 on the season – Concord jumped out to an early 2-0 lead on a two-run Laylagian single in the bottom of the first. The Tide looked as if it could break the game open early.
But the visitors fought back, plating runs in the second, third and fourth innings to take a 4-2 lead. In the bottom of the sixth, Concord senior Nater Wachter laced a two-run double to right field to even the score, and the next batter, Laylagian, grounded a ball through the third baseman’s legs to drive home Wachter and give the Tide a 5-4 lead.
Spaulding evened things up once again in the top of the seventh before the walk-off error off Laylagian’s grounder sent Concord home satisfied, even if it wasn’t the prettiest way to do so.
“We didn’t play very well tonight, but we grinded it out,” head coach Scott Owen said. “Matt Drewes pitched phenomenally. Picked him up when we needed to.”
Drewes wound up with a complete game, allowing five runs (just two earned) on six hits, one walk and four strikeouts. Arguably his biggest inning came in the sixth.
Spaulding led off with a single, followed by a bunt in which Drewes tried to throw out the lead runner at second but was unsuccessful. The next batter also laid down a bunt, but Drewes fielded and fired to third to eliminate the lead runner. He promptly struck out the next batter and induced a pop up to third to end the inning without allowing a run.
“That’s what he does,” Owen said. “He just competes, and he obviously competed tonight. He’s fantastic.”
Before the game, the Tide honored the 11 seniors on this year’s roster, an unusually large number – Owen believes his biggest senior class was 13 or 14 back in 2019. From key starters on Friday night like Brooks Craigue (3-for-3, two runs scored), Wachter (2-for-4, run scored, 2 RBIs) and Laylagian to Zanis Lauris, Kalan Gaudreault, Zach McCoy, Dan Revellese, Drewes, Jacob Plante, Jacob Ryder and Peyton Enis Yearout, it’s a class that’s assuredly had an outsized impact on Concord baseball.
“This group has been great,” Owen said. “They’re leaders. They’ve done everything I ask them. They don’t complain about playing time; when it’s their turn, they go up and try to do the best they can, and you can’t say enough about all of them. They’ve been fantastic. Fun group to coach.”
And while their final regular-season game at Doane Diamond was likely not one of the cleanest games this group has ever played, the Tide walked away with an all-important victory, keeping pace near the top of the Division I standings, where the team current sits in fourth place.
Concord has two games next week, at Pinkerton and at Salem, before the playoffs begin. The lessons the Tide learned under the lights on Friday night could prove quite valuable.
“We didn’t play well, but we did enough to come back and win,” Owen said. “That stuff can be big in the playoffs.”