Gershkoff takes Junior Legion championship

The second-seeded Gershkoff Auto Junior American Legion team topped ATC Riverside to win the state championship on Sunday afternoon at McCarthy Field in West Warwick.

ATC would win the first game of the day 2-1 to force the winner-take-all second game immediately after, which Gershkoff would take 7-3.

Marcus Almada knocked in Gershkoff’s lone run in the first game and Nick DiLorenzo would pitch a strong outing on the mound as he went 6 1/3 innings, allowing just one run and striking out eight batters.

The Gershkoff bats came to life in the second game after falling behind 1-0 in the first inning. Derek LaFazia knocked in two runs while Jack Fontaine and Almada also recorded RBI in the win. RJ Feole and Almada combined to allow just four hits and one run on the mound.

Gershkoff finished the summer with a 19-15 overall record and not only competed in the local Legion season but also traveled to four showcase tournaments to take on teams throughout the region. Expectations were high headed into the season according to manager John Fontaine, who was assisted by former Cranston West coaches Chuck Jones and Ron LaRocca, as well as Barry Fontaine, Randy Stoloff and Chris Barboza.

“We thought we’d be good, we have a lot of talented players. We told the kids that this would be not only a legion team but a showcase team so we did four showcase tournaments. We played a lot of baseball together. We knew we had something special, we just didn’t know what competition we would have in the state. We had a lot of great competition, but we happened to come out on top,” said John Fontaine.

Playing in these tournaments allowed the kids to gain valuable experience both on and off the field as Gershkoff hopes to continue to expand its outreach. After falling in the first game of the championship series, the team was well prepared to turn around minutes later to run it back in the second game.

“We purposely played in lots of difficult tournaments this year. We played above our age group in every tournament that we played in. We had experience playing at a high-level and we also had experience playing multiple games in a day. We also had our entire staff available. We knew we would have the pitching,” said John Fontaine, who also credited Angelo Silvestri for his playoff run on the mound.

The team also won a 14-13 thriller earlier in the playoffs when it took on South Kingstown. Gershkoff trailed 12-5 in the bottom of the sixth but would score eight runs to take the lead. SK tied things up in the seventh to force extras, and DiLorenzo would hit the walk-off single in the ninth.

Most of the roster will be moving up to the senior level next season and the 13-U team just enjoyed a big inaugural campaign. The coaches of Gershkoff including John Fontaine and Dave Schiappa are excited for the future and to be a go-to club for local players.

“The future is bright. The senior legion team is going to be fantastic next year. What this showed was that you can have a local Legion team that can also compete in showcase tournaments. People can look at this team and see that you can do both,” said John Fontaine. “There is something about representing your town or city that you don’t get when you are on the showcase teams where you have kids playing from everywhere. It is something special.”