Towns Pitches Lake Braddock into Regional Final

Kenny Towns was sick to his stomach earlier in the week, but on Wednesday afternoon the Lake Braddock righty made Stone Bridge’s batters reach for the Pepto with seven smooth innings that propelled the Bruins into the Class AAA Northern Region final.

Towns allowed only four hits and just one Bulldog batter reached third base as Lake Braddock turned a pair of key double plays to get out of jams in the second and sixth innings. The efficient pitching meant Towns, the co-player of the year in the Patriot District, had enough left to strike out the side in the seventh and set up Lake Braddock’s fourth game of the year against district rival South County, who defeated Madison 10-0 in the second semifinal.

No matter what happens in the regional final on Friday night (7 p.m.) at Madison, Lake Braddock’s season will continue in the state playoffs. But, a regional championship comes with a first-round home game in the state playoffs next week.

“It feels awesome. I’m so excited, because senior year, you want to go as far as you can,” said Towns of clinching a state playoff berth. “It’s just awesome. The team played so well the whole year and we deserved it.”

Lake Braddock coach Jody Rutherford was non-committal when asked whether he thought his team would like another shot at South County.

“Would I like to play them again? Not necessarily, because they’re a pretty good team,” he said, before going on to praise Madison ahead of the day’s second semifinal.

Not only did Towns force Stone Bridge to hit a number of ground balls to quick-gloved infielders like Alex Lewis, Michael Quinteros and Dylan O’Connor, he got involved in a handful of plays himself.

In the first inning he picked Spenser Rositano, who had opened the game with a hard single to right field, off second base to end the frame. In the second, after O’Connor started a double play by snaring a line-drive from Ty Lighton, Towns was quick off the mound to grab a pop-up from Sid Harvey near the first-base line. In the fourth, he covered first on a play made by O’Connor ranging far to his left and an inning later, he made plays to get Lighton and Harvey again.

“I knew I just needed to go out there and throw strikes,” said Towns, who is bound for the University of Virginia in the fall. “Our defense was playing a hell of a game the whole time and they stepped it up in the last innings even more.”

“It was just a big-time performance in a big-time situation,” Rutherford said.

Rositano said Towns and McLean righty Josh Sborz were the two best pitchers his team had faced this season.

“They both pitched the same speed, but Kenny had a good hook and he kept us guessing,” he said. “He pitched a heck of a game.”

Towns fanned Stone Bridge’s Josh Kuzbel, J.J. White and Ryan Johnston, the Bulldogs’ 2-3-4 hitters, to emphatically end the game.

“Those are three pretty good hitters he struck out,” said Stone Bridge coach Sam Plank.

The Bruins scored a run in the first and second innings to take the lead. They were then handcuffed by Stone Bridge starter Steve Putnick, who went 5 2/3 innings while striking out four and allowing just five hits. One of the runs was unearned.

Lake Braddock centerfielder Alex Gransback led off the game with a single and moved to third on a double down the left-field line by Towns. First baseman Andrew Weidinger drove Gransback in with a sacrifice fly to center. In the second, Mitch Spille hit into what looked like an inning-ending 6-4-3 double play, but he was safe at first and advanced to second on wild throw by Rositano. Gransback drove Spille home with a single.

Rutherford pointed to his team’s defense complementing Towns’ effort as the key to the game.

“The difference tonight is that we played pretty good defense behind him and that’s not always the case with the group we have.”

The Bruins (21-4) are winless in three tries against the Stallions, the only public school to have beaten them this season. The last time the two teams played, in the Patriot District final, South County used a four-run sixth to recover from a 3-1 deficit en route to a 5-3 win. Evan Beal, who scattered six hits over seven innings while striking out three in the last match-up, should be on the mound for South County.