AUBURN – The adrenaline that was racing through his body influenced Derek Doucette’s mindset a little bit. All he could think about was throwing harder and harder.
Once the adrenaline subsided, though, and Doucette realized slowing things down a little bit was the way to go, the Mt. Blue Cougars didn’t stand a chance.
Doucette held 10th-seeded Mt. Blue hitless after the second inning, allowing No. 7 Edward Little to come back with a six-run third inning and win their Eastern Class A preliminary, 8-4, Tuesday at Pettengill Park.
The Eddies (11-6) will face second-seeded Brunswick in the quarterfinals on Thursday.
“I was very nervous, and I finally started throwing my pitches the way I should have the first two innings,” Doucette said. “I was trying to overpower them the first two innings with fastballs, then I just settled down and started throwing my curve ball more.”
“He was up a lot, which isn’t like him. It really isn’t like him,” EL coach Scott Annear said. “He’s such a composed young man. He’s one of those people that I don’t worry about when I put him out there on the field because he makes great adjustments. And he did that.”
Mt. Blue scored three unearned runs in the first and another in the second to take a 4-2 lead before the left-hander found his groove. But for a dropped third strike that allowed John Moloney to reach base in the fourth, Doucette would have retired the last 18 Cougars in a row. He ended up surrendering just four hits while fanning seven and walking one.
“He got stronger as the game went on,” said Mt. Blue coach Gary Parlin, who is stepping down as varsity baseball coach after nine years. “He started out throwing fastballs, and it’s a lesson to (Mt. Blue starter) Adam Gilbert, he went to his off-speed stuff and kept us off-balance.”
Gilbert suffered similar hard luck in the Eddies’ big inning. An error by the third baseman, a walk, and a passed ball allowed Doucette to tie the score with a two-run single to right. Another error and a walk with two out loaded the base for John Alexander, who singled down the left field line to plate Doucette and Kevin Smith and put the Eddies in front for good. Tyler Snowe (two hits) made it 8-4 with a two run single of his own.
“You have runners on base like that with two out, you want to execute and get them home,” Annear said.
“In our losses all year, we’ve had one bad inning like that,” Parlin said. “It’s almost like you know it’s coming.”
The Cougars (8-9) took advantage of EL’s first fielding miscue with some timely, two-out hits to jump out to a first inning lead. Mike Toothaker hit a two-run single and Bobby Duley beat out an infield hit for another RBI to make it 2-0.
The Eddies got a pair back in the bottom of the frame on Justin Ciszewski’s RBI single and a fielder’s choice by Doucette that plated Ciszewski. Adam Wallace’s sacrifice fly in the second made it 4-2, Mt. Blue.
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