The North Shore Twins beat the Langley Blaze 1-0 in a showdown of the two top teams in the B.C. Premier Baseball League Tuesday at North Vancouver’s Parkgate Park.
Marshall Hogan scored Steve Moretto with a single in the bottom of the sixth for the game’s only run, while pitchers Declan Dutton and Cole Dalla-Zanna combined for a five-hit shutout.
Dalla-Zanna pitched the first four frames, giving up four hits and two walks with three strikeouts, before Dutton came in and threw fire for the final three, giving up just one hit while striking out five of the 10 batters he faced.
Catcher Noah Or had a good day at the plate, going two for three with a triple. Langley’s Michael Stovman pitched well in the loss, giving up just one earned run on seven hits and one walk in six innings.
The Twins, under the guidance of head coach Brooks McNiven, followed up their win over Langley with a 3-2 road victory over the North Delta Blue Jays Thursday. Dan Sereda picked up the win against the Jays, giving up two runs in 4.1 innings, while Matthew Watson earned the save. The two wins gave the Twins a 24-8 record for the season, 1.5 games ahead of the Blaze who are 22-9.
Hogan and Moretto have been leading the way at the plate all season for the Twins. Shortstop Moretto has notched 29 runs and 13 RBI in 30 games with a .423 on-base percentage and .303 batting average. Hogan, a first-baseman from Seycove Secondary, leads the team with 15 RBI in 26 games while putting up an average of .333 and an OBP of .412.
Dalla-Zanna has been the workhorse so far, pitching to a 1.94 ERA with 47 strikeouts in 39.2 innings of work, while Tony Walters has put together a 5-0 record with a 2.00 ERA in 38.1 innings, striking out 27.
The Twins have been winning despite missing staff ace Jack DeCooman, a Mulgrave student, for much of the season. DeCooman, who has been away on duty with the junior national team, has a 2-0 record with a miniscule 0.45 ERA in three starts with the Twins this season, racking up 21 strikeouts against just 10 hits and nine walks in 15.1 innings.
The Twins are looking to best their results from last season when they finished second in regular season play and made the final four tournament but were knocked out before reaching the final. The team won the BCPBL regular season and playoff title in 2015, finishing second at Baseball Canada’s 18U National Championships.
They’re on the road this weekend but will play six straight games at Parkgate Park starting with a 1 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. doubleheader Wednesday against the Victoria Eagles.
