Ruden Sports News

WATERBURY — Paddy Galvin’s nickname on the Fairfield Warde baseball team is ‘The Dog.’

“He’s a quiet kid, but when you put him on the mound, you give him the ball and you tell him to compete he’s going to give you a dog effort,” explained Mustangs coach Brett Conner.

Galvin is Warde’s closer and perhaps the most overlooked member of the pitching staff because of the depth of quality starters, but he has been integral to its success. He has not lost a game or blown a save all season, and continued that streak today by finishing off a 4-1 Class LL semifinal victory over Trumbull at Municipal Stadium that sent the Mustangs to the final for the first time since 2016.

Galvin, who started the game at third base, wasted little time between pitches. He went the final two innings, allowing two hits and striking out four, including the final three batters after issuing a leadoff walk in the seventh.

“I always like to keep my rhythm, keep up tempo, don’t let the batter get too comfortable in there,” Galvin said.

Galvin, as if often the case, was overshadowed today, this time by the player he replaced on the mound, Griffin Polley, who won his second start in the tournament after not pitching during the regular season due to a shoulder injury sustained during pitchers’ and catchers’ week prior to the preseason.

Conner figured if Polley could stop one of the state’s best offenses in practice, now healthy he was not a risk to use in the state playoffs. Polley delivered four innings of four-hit ball in the third-seeded Mustangs’ 6-0 second-round win over Conard. Today, after a challenging opening inning, Polley went five, allowing an unearned run on three hits. He finished with five strikeouts and three walks.

The hope for the second straight all-FCIAC state final was dashed in the second game, when Danbury fell behind 3-0 in the opening inning, was held to three hits and shut out by Southington, 6-0.

The Mustangs will face the Blue Knights for the title Saturday at noon at Palmer Field. Warde last won the state title in 1981. In 2002, when Fairfield had one high school, it was the Class LL champion.

“Offensively we just had to take advantage of our opportunities,” Conner said. “We had to make plays behind Polley and Galvin. But I’ll tell you what, when Polley went down at the beginning of the year we asked him just to be ready for this moment. Do what it takes to work your way back. Be ready to compete to get back to Palmer. He was ready. I’m just really proud of him, proud of Galvin, proud of the entire team. They inspire the heck out of me, our coaches, our entire community. They’re a great group. I’m glad to get back to Palmer. I’ve been dying to get back there since 2016. We’re looking to finish the job here.”

Palmer Stadium is the site of all the CIAC baseball finals.

Trumbull, the No. 10 seed, finished the season 18-8. It lost to the Mustangs for the third straight time, including the final day of the regular season and the semifinal round of the FCIAC Tournament.

Connor Johnston, who pitched a complete-game five-hitter and allowed just two earned runs, staked the Eagles to a 1-0 lead in the first with an RBI double.

The Mustangs seized the lead in the bottom half of the inning, on a single, hit batter, walk, sacrifice fly and error.

Trumbull left runners on base in the second, third and fifth innings. Warde scored two more times in the fifth on an error.

“They’re a great team,” Trumbull coach Phil Pacelli said. “Their lineup is just relentless. Especially those first five guys. They just did a little more than we did today. We couldn’t get the hit when we needed it. Connor didn’t have his best stuff today but he emptied the tank and kept us in the game. I couldn’t ask for more. We played in 26 of a possible 28 games. Our goal was to get to Cubeta and we did that and to get to Palmer and we were 21 outs a way.”

With Galvin on a more limited pitch count, Galvin knew he would get into the game, ideally in the fifth inning.

“I’m just mentally locked in, I’m always staying ready to go,” Galvin said.

The Mustangs are now 24-3. It is rare, because baseball is not a sport conducive to a one-and-done format, for teams to win both league and state titles. Staples pulled off the trifecta starting with the regular-season title in 2019. Now Warde is one step away.

“I’ve been waiting since 2016,” Conner said. “I’ve been eating my insides up. We’re going to be there and we’re going to be hungry.”

Shaun Ratchford, coach of the eighth-seeded Hatters, had an uneasy feeling as his team went through warmups prior to tonight’s game with Southington.

“Usually we have a really good in and out, but almost every guy threw the ball over somebody’s head or dropped a ball that they usually catch,” Ratchford said.

The Hatters already had to deal with a delay arriving at the stadium due to their bus breaking down not far from the high school.

Danbury starter Charlie Solomine gave up a triple and single to the second and third batters he faced, but then the Hatters errantly threw the ball around the field and were quickly behind by three runs. they made a pair of errors in the third inning and fourth-seeded Southington (21-3) doubled their lead.

The Hatters (20-6) got a pair of runners on with one out in the fourth when Gabe Pena scorched a ball — right at the second baseman. A possible inning-builder turned into an inning-ending double play.

Ratchford said it was apparent his team was nervous.

“I was surprised because nothing had really fazed the team,” Ratchford said. “Even playing Xavier, the No. 1 team in the state, we were like the little people they were supposed to run over to get here.”

Still, a team that got no preseason attention made it to the semifinal rounds of both the league and state tournaments.

“It was a fun team to coach,” Ratchford said. “There were so many ways we could win, they loved to come to practice to get better. As a coach that’s all you want. You want your teams to come, work hard, continue to grow and get better and they did that.”

Roman Hausmann had two of Danbury’s three hits.