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St. John's Prep makes state baseball tourney

At one time the St. John's Prep baseball team may have looked iffy as a tournament qualifier when it had records of 6-5 and 7-6. It had opened the season 6-1.

The Eagles, spurred on by Jordan Edgett's five-hit pitching over six innings, earned a ticket to the postseason playoffs for the 13th straight year by overpowering highly-ranked Hopkinton, 9-3.

While handing Hopkinton (15-2) only its second loss, the Eagles  (10-7 overall) got a split in their season's series in a huge road victory.

"I was pretty confident we'd do it. We got better, in general," the Prep's 28-year varsity coach, Pat Yanchus said. "I was aware that 1995 was the last time we didn't make it. We hit much better down the stretch. Nor did we have any soft games after today (Arlington, Danvers, Central Catholic)."

Mike Yastrzemski was 3-for-5 with an RBI, Peter Castoldi was 2-for-3 with one RBI, Chris Carmain contributed an RBI single and scored twice and Kyle Pettoroto had an RBI on a ground out.

"It was one of those games where we scored on a wild pitch and also on a run-down," Yanchus said."We also scored some late runs which helped."

Edgett fanned eight, walked two and yielded two unearned runs. Closer Dan Haugh had two strikeouts and walked one in the seventh.