LEWISTON – One of the interesting things about American Legion baseball is it usually brings together players from separate high school and forces many of them into roles they rarely, if ever, have played for their school team.

Such is the case with Willie Emerson, the No. 1 starter at St. Dom’s who was thrust into the unfamiliar role of reliever for Thursday night’s game and shut the door with 2 2/3 innings of outstanding relief to help Gayton Post edge Cole Farms, 6-5, in Zone III American Legion action at Franklin Pasture.

“You’re not warming up as much (as a starter would). You just have to get into a rhythm,” said Emerson, who struck out five and gave up just one hit to earn the save. “You get up early in the count and see what happens.”

“What we’ve told our relievers is when you go to the bullpen, figure out what’s working, and when you come in, throw it. You can’t fall behind in counts. Starters can feel for it. Relievers can’t. They have to throw strikes right off the bat,” Gayton coach Todd Cifelli said. “Willie’s got some awful tough stuff down there at the end of a ballgame to put a bat on the ball with. And we know he’s mentally tough. That’s a part of relieving that’s not in the box score.”

Cole Farms, which made a number of costly fielding (four errors) and baserunning mistakes, helped Emerson out immediately by popping a sacrifice bunt attempt back to him on the mound. Emerson then fired the ball to first to cut down the potential tying run for an inning-ending double play.

Emerson struck out the side in the sixth, gave up a one out single to Zach Cantor (4-for-4, home run), then with Cantor representing the tying run at third and two out, got Nick Derice to chase an 0-2 curve out of the strike zone to end the game.

“If I was just throwing strikes and getting ahead in counts, I could let my breaking stuff work and get them to chase and get outs,” Emerson said.

“We had a rested bullpen, but we just had a feel that he was the guy to close it out and he did a great job,” Cifelli said.

Cole Farms took a quick 2-0 lead off starter Kyle Neagle in the first when Cantor parked one over the fence in left and Joe Billings delivered an RBI single. Gayton (7-1) immediately grabbed the lead for good in the bottom of the frame despite not getting a hit. Three walks by starter Taylor Valente and three errors by second baseman Josh Dumaine led to three unearned runs.

Gayton’s bats had a little more say in the next three-run rally in the second, although another error by the second baseman started the trouble. Travis Dyke stroked an RBI triple off Valente, then scored on Erik Waite’s double to make it 5-2. Greg LaBonte capped Gayton’s scoring with a single to send Waite home.

Sam Mason came on in relief and silenced Gayton from there. Neagle appeared to be settling down until the fifth, when Cole Farms pulled back within a run on Josh Sundquist’s RBI double and Derice’s two-run double. Derice was thrown out trying to stretch it into a triple, which kept him from scoring the tying run when Billings followed with a base hit that knocked Neagle out. Billings then got doubled-off on the failed bunt attempt.

“I don’t think we came prepared to play today,” said Cole Farms coach Aaron Talon, whose team dropped to 5-4. “We have 95 percent of our team back from last year, which was a very successful year, and I think some of these guys think it’s going to come naturally. The zone’s too good with too many good teams, you can’t do that.”