Marlins Repeat in Upper Makefield

By James D’Arcangelo

“Repeat! Repeat!”
The bubbly chants uncorked the celebratory mood in the overflowing stands at Upper Makefield’s George Strachan Field, bringing a familiar end to the town’s youth baseball season Wednesday, June 17.
The Marlins had just won the most senior division (11-12 year-old) of the Cal Ripken (a parallel to Little League) play, 10-0 over the Braves, in the season’s championship game.
Difficult in any league, the Marlins had found a way to duplicate supremacy, even after being challenged by a long losing streak mid-season. But, repeat they did.
As in any level of baseball, it’s pitching and timely hitting that dictates who controls the game. Throughout the season, head coach Tom Kovalcik implored the team to focus on the core strategy, “just throwing strikes” and getting players on base.
The Braves, which had beaten the Dodgers, 13-3, to advance to the finals, were baffled by the superlative speed, location, and mix of pitches from Alexandro Kovalcik and his brother Juliano. Neither pitcher walked a batter.
Alexandro allowed two hits, while striking out nine, in three innings. The only two batters with hits off of Alexandro were Drew Glenn, who had a double off of the left field fence, and James O’Donnell, who poked a single up the middle.
Juliano was just as strong as Alexandro, shutting down the Braves’ bats in one inning of relief as the game was stopped in the fourth inning due to the 10-run mercy rule.
The Marlins’ hitting was a full team effort. Virtually all Marlins had a hit, and all players reached base. Joe Pomeroy catapulted a towering (estimated at 240 feet) opposite-field home run to right field off of Braves pitcher Drew Glenn.
Juliano Kovalcik turned on a high fastball from Glenn to crush a line drive home run out to left field. As the Marlins steadily built their lead, Chris Beverly, Taylor Goldberg and Raymond Pfundt had key doubles. Chase D’Arcangelo, 2-for-3 on the day, knocked in Matteo Cariola on a single up the middle for the game-ending, 10th run.
As importantly, D’Arcangelo prolonged the key 4-run third inning with a two-out single to right field (driving in Goldberg), which ultimately set up the Kovalcik and Pomeroy home runs to follow.
Winners in the end, the Marlins, struggled midseason. With key players out of the lineup, the Marlins slumped to a multiple-game losing streak.
When the team turned things around, Coach Kovalcik rejoiced in the kids’ excitement and the magnitude of the accomplishment, but even after capturing the title again, he still stressed a season-long perspective that is both rare and grounding in this day and age of often over-enthusiastic parents and coaches.
“I am most proud of the team and how well it defined sportsmanship,” stated Kovalcik after the title win. “We never lost sight of respecting each other, the other teams, and the game.”
With that philosophy, it’s not hard to imagine a “three-peat” might be in order.