The Boys U-16 Baseball Team A privately sponsored Garden City U-16 baseball team (comprised of 14 boys from Garden City High School and Chaminade) entered the first round of the Long Island Connie Mack League playoffs as the number 1 seed (based on the records of 24 such teams from Long Island) and with great hope based upon its 17-1 record (good enough to win the league's regular season championship) this summer.

But all that was now in the past and based on the league's playoff format, Garden City would have to open its post-season on August 6th at Community Park in an always dangerous single elimination game against the Long Island Astros (a select team from several towns in Nassau County and winner of their last six games). As you would suspect, this first Sunday in August would bring temperatures in the mid-80's and along with the heat of the day, Garden City's bats began hot and remained hot denting the scoreboard early and often.

In the first two innings, Garden City would tally eight runs powered by triples by Colin Ridgway and Terry Curtin (2 RBI's) and a two run home run over the left field fence by Andrew Cauchi. Additional offensive fireworks would be ignited by a long triple by Michael Mancusi, two RBI singles by Paul Chilelli, two long sacrifice flies by Freddy Stutzmann and finally Kevin Derle who would deliver Garden City's final salvo - a two run home run to right in the bottom of the sixth. Support in the form of excellent defense would be supplied by Will Volz (4 assists at third) and catcher Matt Thaler who threw out one Astro attempting to steal second and a diving tag out of another runner attempting to steal home. Combine all this fine hitting and fielding with Cauchi's three hit / seven strike out complete game pitching performance and Garden City's would turn the Astros' dreams of a championship into a 12-2 nightmare and an early play-off exit.

Next up for the Garden City boys of summer would be a best two-out of-three semi-final series vs. a 16-4 team from East Meadow. Game 1, which was played at St. Paul's on August 8th, would see GC put forth a performance they would soon want to forget suffering a 12-2 drubbing at the hands of the spirited EM Mustangs. They wouldn't have much time to forget as Game 2 was to be played less than 24 hours later at Colt Park in East Meadow. This game would start as a supreme pitcher's duel with Garden City's Colin Ridgway's goose eggs being matched by an East Meadow southpaw who struck out seven of the first nine he faced. Garden City would break through in the 4th when Cauchi's two out single plated Chilelli, who had legged out an infield hit with the game's first run. GC would go on to score 7 more times over the next three innings sparked by big hits by Joe Young, Curtin, Stutzmann and Thaler. Through it all was Ridgway's pitching which continually spooked the Mustangs. Ridgway's artistry with a complete game 4 hit, 6 strikeout, no walk masterpiece resulted in an 8-1 victory forcing a deciding Game 3 two days later.

The final game saw GC move out to a quick lead and grow it to 5-0 after four innings. A pesky East Meadow team kept "clawing" back and finally was able to take a 7-5 lead going to the bottom of the 7th inning. Although GC was able to get the tieing runs on base, they were not able to get them home and therefore saw their season come an end. East Meadow moved on to win the league championship the following week.

It was a very successful season for the team as they participated in a July 4th tournament out at Baseball Heaven where they made it into the semifinals. The team was also chosen as the host representative for the Mickey Mantle North Atlantic Regional tournament which was played at Hofstra University and featured teams from Canada, Upstate New York, Long Island, New York City, New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts.

The regular season was highlighted with victories over the other 2 semi-final teams including an 8 run seventh inning rally to defeat a tough LI Indians team (led by a 3 run homer from Terry Curtin) and a convincing 10-2 victory over the second seeded North Shore Vikings in the last regular season game (led by 3 hits from Kevin Derle and Andrew Cauchi).

The pitching staff was anchored by Andrew Cauchi, Colin Ridgway, Michael Mancusi and Terry Curtin. Catching responsibilities were handled by Paul Chilelli, Mark Bader and Matt Thaler. Infield and outfield duties were manned by Kyle Boelsen, Kevin Derle, Bobby Fargnoli, Joe LaCorte, Freddy Stutzmann, Will Volz and Joe Young.

Several awards were earned by the boys with Chilelli and Fargnoli being selected for a Long Island Connie Mack all star game and Cauchi being selected to play in a New York Greater Sandlot game which was held at Shea Stadium.

The players and their parents would like to express a sincere thanks to the coaching staff which included Mike Derle, Fred Stutzmann, Don Young and Brian Ridgway.

The boys will be taking a few weeks off and then hitting the diamond again to participate in Connie Mack's fall league.

Congratulations to the boys on a fine season.