LACONIA – All season, Bishop Brady head coach Skip Foy could always count on his starting pitchers. Whether it was Mike Thresher, Owen Thornton or Charlie Bolnick, all three consistently gave the Giants chances to win games. 

But on Wednesday, in the Division III semifinals against No. 3 White Mountains (17-2), Thornton started rusty and only recorded one out.

He allowed an infield single, hit by pitch, infield single, RBI single, fielder’s choice and a walk before Foy pulled him in favor of Thresher who’d pitched a complete game in Saturday’s quarterfinal win over Fall Mountain. Trailing just 2-0 at the time, Foy needed to halt the bleeding right there.

“(Thresher) was on three-days’ rest, but Owen’s been great all year, too,” Foy said of what went into the decision on who to start. “We've had three starters that I have confidence in, so it wasn't like I was taking a big risk with Owen to get two to three innings out of him. (He) had a little control problem; we made a couple mistakes, nerves I think in the first inning got the best of us. A couple infield plays that we could've made.” 

The quick hook stabilized things in the first inning, but it wound up not mattering in the end, as Bishop Brady fell 4-0 ending its season at 16-2. It was the final game for five seniors: Thresher, Nolyn LaFleur, Bradyn Mundy, Chris Grimbilas and Bryce Miller.

The offense, which entered Wednesday averaging over 10 runs per game, couldn’t do much against the Spartans’ Karter Deming.

“We had guys on base, just couldn't get them in again,” Foy said. (Deming) is a real good pitcher. We just couldn't quite put it together offensively. … He was fairly quick. And he had a pretty good curveball, too. I think his speed caught us a little off guard, but we knew he threw hard. I had some scouting reports on him. We had the pitching machine cranked up yesterday. I think we hesitated a little bit too much at the plate. You can't hesitate when someone's throwing pretty hard. You either gotta go or you don’t.”

The Giants only had three hits in the game.

Though they threatened with two outs in the bottom of the seventh after a walk from John McKerley and single from Andrew Hunton, Winn Thomas lined out to shortstop to end the game and a phenomenal season for Bishop Brady baseball. 

Such optimism was the tone of Foy’s postgame message to his team, despite the undesired outcome.

“Of course they're all disappointed and so am I, but still when you end up 16-2 (and) you make the state semifinals, that’s not a bad season,” Foy said. “I don't feel like we underachieved or anything. I think definitely we had a good enough team to get to the finals. But I told them to keep their head up. It was a great season still.”

]]>