Little Leaguers Drop Home Run Derby

Matt Hurley tied the game in the final inning for Barrington Little League’s Major Division All-Stars with a two-run homer in the District II playoff contest at Sherwood Park in Barrington on Sunday evening.

But Sean Dunphy of Darlington American Little League of Pawtucket clubbed the team’s seventh homer in the bottom of the sixth inning to give his team a 10-9 win.

The two teams will meet again Monday at 5:45 pm at Slater Park in Pawtucket. The winner goes on to the Little League state playoffs.

Barrington’s 11-12 year olds jumped on top in the first inning on a two-run homer by Andy Marra. Darlington came right back with three runs on a leadoff homer by pitcher Kyle DePatie -- the first of three home runs he hit in the game – and a two run blast by Colin Gauthier to take a 3-2 lead after one inning.

Barrington threatened in the top of the second inning after a double down the right filed line by Matt Zelznick and a walk to catcher Tucker Flint. The runners were stranded after strikeouts by starting pitcher Cabot Maher and Chase Griffin.

Darlington tacked on three more runs in the bottom of the second on a leadoff homer by Jordan Perdomo – he hit two in the game, a single by Nick Crawley and DePatie’s second home run. The runs dropped Barrington into a 6-2 hole.

Neither team scored in the third.

Barrington started a comeback in the fourth inning when Aidan Gasbarro singled, Flint walked, Griffin singled to drive in a run and Jake Studley singled to drive in another run. Marra then was hit under his left arm by a pitch to load the bases. But Hurley took a called third strike on the outside corner to end the rally.

Darlington came right back to up the lead to four runs when Bobby Pierce got on with a bunt single and DePatie drilled his third home run to make the score 8-4.

Third baseman and pitcher Colin Scorpio cut the lead to 8-5 with a leadoff home run in the fifth inning for Barrington. Darlington came right back again on Perdomo’s second home run to up the lead to 9-5.

Down to its final three outs, Barrington rallied to tie the game in the top of the sixth on back-to-back singles by Griffin, Studley and Marra, who scored from third on a wild pitch, and Hurley’s home run on a 3-2 count. The next three batters ground out and popped out.

Griffin came in to relieve Michael Pfeiffer in the bottom of hte sixth. He struck out the first two batters he faced, including DePatie who led off the inning with a chance to hit his fourth consecutive homer. Brendan Aldridge also went down swinging before Dunphy ended the game with a towering opposite-field bomb to right field.