CT Mission won a gold medal in baseball at the Nutmeg State Games. Front row, from left to right: coach Chris Moore, Eamon Moore, Ryan Ollestad, Sam Leopold, Andrew Cohen and Bennett Cole. Back row, from left to right, coach Jim Nastri, Dylan Nastri, Will Boone, Dan Renwick, Ben Tauber, Jack Stokesbury, Connor Harris and Manager Steve ” Dober ” Harris. Missing from photo: coach Ron Theriault and Adam Theriault.
NEW BRITAIN, July 28 – A year ago, a group of young baseball players from Avon went to the state finals in Little League baseball. Playing in the Major Division (ages 11-12), the Avon ballplayers won 13 straight games to win the District 6 championship and the Section II tournament. Their only setbacks were a pair of losses to Fairfield American in the best-of-3 state final.
The boys haven’t stopped playing baseball.
Last fall, nine Avon players joined together with three players from Glastonbury to form a team called CT Mission. They picked it up where they left off in the spring, joining the competitive East Shore Travel league from New Haven playing in the 11-team U-13 Elite Division. CT Mission also played in the AAU state tournament.
The team brought home some hardware Sunday, winning the Junior Baseball (ages 13-14) tournament at the 25th annual Nutmeg State Games in New Britain with a 10-0 win over Fairfield at Beehive Stadium.
CT Mission went 4-0 in the tournament to bring home the gold medal. CT Mission won three games in the round robin portion of the eight-team tournament. CT Mission scored six runs in the sixth inning to rally from a three-run deficit and beat Pomperaug-Southbury, 11-10. With two runs in the sixth inning, CT Mission rallied from a one-run deficit to beat the Burlington Bulldogs, 9-8. And in the tournament opener, Dylan Nastri had a grand slam as CT Mission rolled over the Bristol Thunder, 23-3.
This wasn’t the only tournament that CT Mission won this spring. The squad captured the War at the Shore tournament in East Lyme and were second at the Triple Crown AAA Wood Bat Classic in North Branford. CT Mission won 21 games in the East Shore Travel league and have gone 33-24 since last fall.
CT Mission advanced to the quarterfinals of the 36-team state AAU championship tournament, losing to eventual state champion CT Combat, 7-5.
Nastri was the team’s leading hitter over the past year with Sam Leopold, Jack Stokesbury and Dan Renwick also hitting well. Ben Tauber was the top pitcher this season with the squad getting strong performances on the mound from Leopold, Nastri, Connor Harris and Andrew Cohen.
Adam Theriault was solid defensively in the infield along with Will Boone and catcher Ryan Ollestad. In the outfield, Bennett Cole and Eamon Moore played well. The team plans to compete next year in the U-14 division.
BASEBALL: In the 10 and under tournament, Canton Youth Baseball finished fourth, dropping the bronze medal game to Meriden, 13-3. Earlier this week, Connor Clement hit his first career home run in a 16-6 loss to West Hartford Little League.
TRACK & FIELD: Canton’s Matt Graziano easily won the discus at the 25th annual Nutmeg State Games at Willow Brook Park in New Britain. Graziano, 17, threw the discus 178 feet, 1 inch. He will attend UConn in the fall and will participate in track and field.
Avon’s Alan Brooks won a gold medal in the discus and shot at the Nutmeg Games in the age 75-79 division. Brooks, 77, threw the shot 35 feet, 6½ inches and threw the discus 109 feet.
WRESTLING: Canton High wrestling coach Josh Kaplan competed in the Nutmeg State Games wrestling tournament and won the open division at 174 pounds. Kaplan defeated Dom Folino, 6-4 in overtime in the championship match to win the gold medal.
OTHERS? Any other valley competitors who did well in the Nutmeg State Games? Email us at [email protected] and we’ll add their accomplishments to this story.
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