By Ron P. Coderre

As most local high school teams are approaching the end of regular season play Plainfield High School was the last unbeaten team in the region and possibly the state.  That is until last week when the Panthers dropped a pair of heart breaking contests to a pair of Eastern Connecticut Conference  rivals.

After losing to East Lyme and Waterford, the Panthers rebounded with a solid win over a very good St. Bernard team.  Still sporting a gaudy 16-2 record, Plainfield now has the target removed from its back.

Woodstock Academy making a run at qualifying for the ECC and State tournaments picked up two wins.  Ellis Tech, enjoying one of its best seasons of late also won two games and raised its record to 12-7.  Putnam, which went 1-1 on the week, has also qualified for postseason play.  Killingly and Tourtellotte are playing out the string after having been mathematically eliminated from qualifying for the postseason.

Panthers Continue Playing Solid Baseball

The East Lyme Vikings broke up a 2-2 pitchers duel with a run in the bottom of the ninth inning to hand Plainfield its first loss of the season 3-2.  Kyle Boarman started and pitched well for Plainfield, carrying a 2-0 lead into the last of the seventh but relinquished the tying runs before being relieved by Jordan Federer, who absorbed the loss in the ninth.  The Panthers could only muster five hits against the Viking pitching.

The Panthers then went on the road again in a night game against Waterford and their bats went silent, only picking three hits as they were shutout by the Lancers 2-0 for their second loss in two days.  Mike Esposito (5-1) suffered the loss.

Plainfield got back on the winning track with a 3-2 route-going win by Boarman, who raised his record to 5-0.  In this game the Panthers tallied the winning run in the home half of the seventh inning in picking up victory number 16.  Federer and Oscar Garza had doubles in leading the eight-hit Panther attack.

Woodstock wasted a great pitching performance by Will Bourgeois when it was dropped by ECC Large Division foe Fitch 2-1.  Buoyed by the Bourgeois performance, the Centaurs rebounded with and 8-4 win over Killingly and a 12-1 victory over Griswold.  Winning pitcher Alden Brennan was the beneficiary of a 19-hit Centaur offensive barrage led by a pair of Kolby Reggione doubles and a J.P. Bergeron home run in the victory over the Redmen.  Bourgeois came back and took the mound in the win over the Wolverines.  Once again the Centaur bats were on fire, producing 17 hits.  Trent Appleton with a double and triple was the big gun for the 7-9 Acads.

Killingly continued to plummet as it was also beaten by New London 8-4 to drop to 3-15 overall and 1-9 in the ECC Medium Division.  Putnam and Ellis Tech hooked up in a nip-and-tuck affair with the Eagles pulling out a 6-5 Constitution State Conference East Division victory.  Thompson’s Jared Carignan was the winning Tech hurler.  Charles Innes had a double and triple in support of Carignan.  The Techster continued their winning ways behind the tosses of Innes who doubled to help his cause in a 7-3 win over Vinal Tech.  Carignan also had a two-bagger for the 12-7 Eagles.

Putnam bounced back behind winning pitcher Josh Allard (5-2) with a 6-1 win over Wheeler.  Tyler Genest and Luke Sarsfield with doubles aided Allard’s cause.  The Clippers are 12-5 on the season.

Tourtellotte was shutout 11-0 by Lyman to open its week.  The Tigers came back with a 4-2 extra inning victory over Wheeler.  Shawn Houle went the distance in the eight-inning affair for the win.  Houle, who’s been one of the Tigers bright spots also had an 8-7 win over the Stonington Bears.  Houle, Ben Brissette and Jake Sivia all had doubles in the win.  The Tigers are 4-14 overall and 2-8 in the ECC Small Division.

Putnam Science Academy fell to 1-5 as the Mustangs absorbed an 8-0 loss to St. Thomas More and an 11-6 defeat at the hands of The Learning Clinic.

RPC’s Super Standings: Plainfield 16-2; Putnam 12-6; Ellis Tech 12-7; Marianapolis 9-7; Woodstock Academy 9-9; Pomfret School 4-2; Tourtellotte 4-14; Killingly 4-15; PSA 1-5.