CAPE ELIZABETH — Greely’s baseball team got a wakeup call Monday when it suffered its first loss of the season, falling at home to rival Yarmouth.
Friday afternoon, the Rangers took their frustrations out on another rival, Cape Elizabeth.
Greely pounded out 13 hits, four of which came from catcher Ryan Kolben, including a home run. Ace pitcher Zach Johnston threw five shutout innings as the Rangers built a 10-run lead and went on to a 10-3 victory, improving to 7-1 on the season.
“It was a nice bounce-back for us,” said Greely Coach Derek Soule. “I think the pregame focus and the energy in general was better and we had three good days of practice. We don’t take anything for granted. We lost an entire season just a couple years ago, so every one of these 16 regular-season games are special.”
Before Johnston even took the mound, the Rangers staked him to a three-run lead. Kolben doubled home a run off Capers starting pitcher Colin Smith, Sam Almy scored another with a groundout, and a third run scored on a passed ball.
Cape Elizabeth (3-4) put runners on in each of the first two innings but couldn’t score.
Then Greely opened it up.
In the third, Kolben walked on four pitches, moved up on a single by Brooks Williams (three hits), took third on a wild pitch and scored when Johnston grounded out to second.
In the fourth, with Sam Bischoff on in relief for the Capers, Marky Axelsen (three hits) singled with two outs, bringing up Kolben, who crushed a fastball to deep center. Even though the wind was blowing in, the ball carried over the fence for a two-run homer and a 6-0 advantage.
“I was sitting fastball and just hitting anything in the zone,” said Kolben, who will play at the University of Massachusetts next year. “I didn’t want to let it go past me. I could just tell it was going out.”
Jackson Leding’s RBI double and Axelsen’s run-scoring single made it 8-0 in the fifth. Kolben capped the Rangers’ offense in the seventh with a two-run double.
Johnston, who has a 0.00 ERA through four starts, allowed four hits and two walks while striking out nine.
“I don’t really care how many hits I give up,” said Johnston, who will pitch at Wake Forest University next year. “As long as the other team has a zero when I’m throwing, it’s fine with me.”
Cape Elizabeth fought to the end, scoring three runs in the bottom of the seventh on a bases-loaded walk, an RBI single by Smith and a double play grounder with the bases loaded. Almy closed it out by getting Owen Tighe to pop to second.
“Obviously, Greely has a super ballclub, said Capers Coach Glenn Reeves. “They can do it all. They can hit, they can pitch, they can play defense. They have a great defense. It takes an ‘A’ game to beat them, and unfortunately, we didn’t have that today.”
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