St. Joseph wins 3rd straight GMCT game with a walk off, as 7th inning rally tops Spotswood 4-3 to clinch finals trip

It wasn’t as clean, perhaps, as the first two, but they’ll take it.

The fifth-seeded St. Joseph of Metuchen baseball team already had a first round win in eight innings over Sayreville, and a quarterfinal win over Metuchen in nine – both 1-0 in walk off fashion – heading into Saturday’s GMC tournament semifinal against eighth-seed Spotswood. 

And then they did it again, scoring three runs in the bottom of the 7th to come back for a 4-3 win, sending the Falcons to their fourth GMC Tournament final in the last five years.

St. Joseph (13-6) now will meet 11th-seed Edison, which beat Middlesex 3-0 earlier in the day, next Saturday at 2:00 pm in the Jim Mulowney GMC Championship Tournament final at East Brunswick Magnet School.

Spotswood (14-9) got on the board first with an RBI double from starting pitcher Carter Cumiskey, but Joe’s got one back in the bottom of the inning to tie it at three, on a single by J.P. Zayle.

After a scoreless fourth, the Chargers took the lead back in the fifth. Cumiskey singled, as did Will Buchan, then Brandon Rivera tried to bunt them over, but it was so perfect he actually reached base with no throw. Gavin Romeo walked in a run, but Buchan later got caught off third in a rundown, and Tyrus Lazar struck out to end the inning.

In the sixth, with two on Cumsikey drove in another run with a 3-6 fielder’s choice.

And Cumiskey looked good on the mound, even getting out of a bases loaded jam in the bottom of the first, where is had been a victim of a bloop into no man’s land in short left field between the left fielder, third baseman and shortstop.

Down 3-1 in the seventh, the Falcons went to work. After Kristian Almanzar led off with a strike out, Walter Christian doubled, and Zach Penley singled, but not deep enough for Almanzar to score. But back to the top of the order, Bobby Christensen doubled to tied the game, leaving him at second with one out and Zayle at the plate. All he needed was a base hit, and he got it, scoring Christensen to walk-off with a trip to Saturday’s GMCT finals.

Cumiskey took the loss for Spotswood to fall to 4-3; Domenic Erbafina got his second straight win in relief for the Falcons.

Due to technical issues, we will not have postgame audio from today’s game. In it’s place, here’s how the dramatic seventh inning unfolded for St. Joseph: