Baseball: Westerly scores two in the seventh to down Norwich Free Academy

Well, it sure feels like it does.

The situation on Friday night for the Westerly baseball team?

Down by a run, top of the seventh inning, against Eastern Connecticut Conference opponent Norwich Free Academy with No. 8 batter Tyler Falcone leading things off.

Just another day at the office for the Bulldogs.

Jack Zerbarini (2 hits) came through with a 2-out, RBI single to break a 2-2 tie and Zack Miner shut the door on the mound on NFA in the home half as Westerly (10-4) won its eighth straight game with a 3-2 non-league victory at Thomas J. Dodd Memorial Stadium.

"Collectively they just trust themselves that eventually we're going to come around, find a way at anytime to tie it up or take the lead," Westerly coach Ron Sposato said.

Trailing 2-1 heading into the seventh, Falcone battled back from a 1-2 count to draw a leadoff walk for the Bulldogs. Kevin Saglio followed with a seeing-eye single between first and second that put runners on the corners.

Leadoff hitter Luke Gwaltney stepped up and hit a ball far enough in right field to NFA's Avery Guernsey for a sacrifice fly that scored Falcone and tie things up at 2-2.

Saglio advanced to second on a ground ball to third for the second out. Following a four-pitch walk drawn by Tom Fiore, the Wildcats (8-4) summoned their closer Jonas Tiburcio to the mound in relief of Jacob Holmberg to face Zerbarini in the clean-up spot.

Zerbarini fell behind in the count 0-and-2 before connecting on a single to center allowing Saglio to score the go-ahead run.

"I was happy to see Jack come through in that spot," Sposato said. "He's a sophomore and there's a lot of pressure there and he hit a high fast ball to bring in the go-ahead run."

That set the stage for Miner on the mound.

"When you have someone like Zack on the mound, you're feeling really confident," Sposato said."

Miner bookended a pair of strikeouts around a fly ball to right to end it. The senior righty, struck out five and walked in two innings of relief to pick up the win.

Fiore (6 strikeouts, 3 walks) threw well over his five innings of work for Westerly. He allowed a pair of unearned runs in the second - Luke Deshefy knocked in both with a two-out single that put NFA ahead 2-1.

"Tom did a great job for us," Sposato said. "We had a error and a walk there and against a team like NFA, you make that one mistake and it can come back to hurt you.

"Our guys, once that happened, stayed positive. They never get down."

Zerbarini gave Westerly a 1-0 lead in the top of the first - with a RBI single that scored Fiore, who walked with two outs and advanced to second on a balk.

Westerly improved to 2-0 against ECC competition this season - earlier this year the Bulldogs defeated Waterford, 5-0.

rzalusky@thewesterlysun.com