‘Jacks baseball sweep doubleheader
TUPPER LAKE — The Tupper Lake baseball team continued its dominating ways when it swept a home doubleheader over the St. Regis Falls Saints on Monday. The Lumberjacks recorded a 15-0 victory over the Saints in the first game and a 17-0 win in the second.
The win marked the ninth in a row for Tupper Lake, which improved to 10-2 overall and 9-0 in Section X’s East Division. It’s the longest win streak since the 2022 season, when the Lumberjack won 11 consecutive games.
“It’s always a nice win streak you’re pushing double digits — in the MLB, they start talking about that being a feat right there,” Tupper Lake head coach Dan Brown said.
In 10 games against Section X opponents, the Lumberjacks have outscored their foes 154-7. While the bats were alive once again on Tuesday, the team had an even stronger performance on the mound from its two pitchers, Wyatt Godin and Cooper Cuttaia.
Godin opened the first game of the doubleheader by tossing a no-hitter with 10 strikeouts. In the second contest, Cuttaia allowed just one hit and struck out six batters. It was the second time this season that a Lumberjacks pitcher recorded a no-hitter. Griffin Shaheen achieved the feat on May 3 against St. Lawrence.
“I think our biggest strength this year is that we have pitching,” Brown said. “We have five guys that would be the one or two on any team in the division. We have six guys that could pitch for any team in the division. When you don’t have to start writing down on paper, who is going to pitch when and you’ve got to have pitch counts below this. It certainly makes coaching a heck of a lot easier. It gives the team a whole lot more confidence. We just know, if we swing the bats we’re going to play a five-inning game because our pitching staff is going to keep the runs below two.”
In the first game, the Lumberjacks rattled off three runs in the first inning and added two more in the second. Despite scoring five runs, the team had just two hits.
Tupper Lake then heated up by scoring eight times in the bottom of the fourth to close out the contest in five innings. The team recorded 10 of its 13 hits in the final two innings.
“We came out a little bit flat, 3:45 (p.m.) is an early start,” Brown said. “We played a tough yesterday, we play tomorrow, then we play Friday and Saturday. It’s just a lot of baseball, and I think we’re starting to see that hitting the end of the road fatigue. We had some timely hits and we buckled down when we had to.”
Tupper Lake’s Karter Kenniston rounded out his three-hit performance with a home run in the bottom of the fourth. Kennsiton also had double and a single. Godin also had three hits in the win.
Ryder Willett batted 2-4 with single and a double. Teammates Cody Auclair, Grant Bencze, Logan Flagg, Kyler McClain and Luke Robillard had one hit each.
St. Regis Falls’ Landen Cox had five strikeouts before being relieved in the fourth.
In the second game, Tupper Lake jumped out to an early 7-0 lead and never looked back. The team scored at least two runs in every inning as every batter got on base at least once in the win.
“Everyone contributed today,” Brown said. “We had everyone off the bench, we had everybody in the game, everybody hitting and everybody touching bases.”
Kenniston and Shaheen each recorded a triple and single for Tupper Lake, while Auclair also had two hits in the game. Bencze, Cuttaia, McClain, Robillard and Garrett Dewyea had one hit each. The Lumberjacks finished with 11 hits.
The Saints’ Peter Arcadi started on the mound and had two strikeouts. Hunter Woods entered in releif in the fourth and struck out one. St. Regis Falls’ Tanner Austin had the lone hit in the contest.
With only a few games left in the season and their win streak still intact, the Lumberjacks were slated to host Madrid-Waddington on Wednesday.
“It’s scary when you get toward the end of a season, because if you’re a baseball fan you know its a game of numbers,” Brown said. “It’s a game of averages, so what goes up must come down and what goes down must go up. We just want to ride this high as long as we can keep riding it.”
The team will host Harrisville in the team’s final home game of the regular season at 7 p.m. on Friday at the Tupper Lake Municipal Park.