The Norwich Sea Unicorns were victorious Sunday afternoon 3-1 over Worcester to secure their first win on their home soil in 2024.
It was a classic pitchers duel at Dodd Stadium between starters Nick Pavia of Worcester and Andrew Rondini of Norwich. Both teams’ offenses were held scoreless through the first three innings of play. The visitors cracked through first in the top of the 4th, but the Sea Unicorns answered right back in the bottom of the inning to draw the game even at 1. Norwich grabbed the lead in the 5th inning and extended their lead in the 7th on a Bo Yaworski RBI single into center. The hit for Yaworski was his first of the summer along with his first RBI.
Some defensive miscues from Worcester along with some wild pitches from the Bravehearts’ pitching staff were also a factor in the ballgame. Worcester committed three errors defensively along with a wild pitch and a passed ball. The throwing error made in the 5th proved to be costly for Worcester as it led to Norwich’s 2nd run of the afternoon which would stand to be the deciding run.
Coach Murphy’s team continued their aggressive baserunning on Sunday swiping three more bags in route to their second victory of the summer. On the season, Norwich has now collected 8 stolen bases which leads all teams in the league. Defensively, Norwich played sound baseball headlined by center fielder Chris Carson who was responsible for starting an inning ending double play in the first and a diving catch in shallow centerfield to end the ballgame.
The bullpen for Norwich bounced back nicely working five scoreless innings after a strong start from Andrew Rondini who punched out 6 Worcester batters in his Sea Unicorn debut this summer. Reliever Andrew Gaines earned the victory for the Sea Unicorns in his first Future’s League appearance and Giovanni Conte secured the save (1) in the winning effort for Norwich.