Coral Gables Blanks Mater To Win Shootout Title

Championship Gallery

Adversity is something that most sports teams run into at one point or another. How teams overcome struggles is often what separates the champions from the rest of the pack.

Thursday evening in the HSBN March Madness Shootout Gold Championship at St. Thomas University, the Coral Gables Cavaliers showed that they are ready to move on from their mid-season struggles. Gables came into the tournament as a very low seed, with a tough road through a very competitive Gold Bracket. The Cavaliers barn-stormed their way to the finale, then finished things off with a 3-0 victory over Mater Academy to win it all.

Senior ace Andrew Cabezas tossed a complete-game for the shutout victory. The right-hander topped out in the low 90’s on the radar gun, shutting down a very deep and dangerous Lions lineup.

“Everyone is ecstatic; we needed this win,” Cabezas said. “We had a good start and then a rough patch, and when better to get hot then at Spring Break. The atmosphere was awesome, all of our fans were here, and everyone was in the dugout hyped up just trying to get that win for our guys.”

In a unique twist of fate, Cabezas faced his former team for the first time since transferring to Coral Gables last year. With so much friendship shared between the guys, the biggest challenge was not in wanting any sort of revenge. It was rather an acknowledgement on both sides what a tough challenge they both had in store. Cabezas scattered four hits and three walks, while striking out five.

He was backed by a defense that made several big plays, letting their ace know it was not just him against his old team. It was two championship-caliber clubs playing in a title game, and both sides played like such. The Cavaliers got an incredible catch from shortstop Coco Montes to rob Alex Rodriguez of a sure base hit leading off the seventh inning, and they then turned their third double play of the game to close things out.

“We had a game plan in how to face them, and it didn’t work out in the beginning. They were being aggressive and getting their hits here and there, and I just had to adjust,” Cabezas said. “It wasn’t my best outing, and I didn’t have the double-digit strikeouts like I usually have. But oh my God, the defense was phenomenal. All I had to do was tip my cap to them.”

Mater Academy had an equally impressive starter on the mound in right-hander Tyler Perez. The junior went five full innings and also recorded five strikeouts, keeping things tight and giving his guys every chance to stay in the game.

Coral Gables got all the runs it would need in the third. Jesus Pineda led off with a scorcher deep to center field and raced around the bases for a triple. Montes followed by smacking the second pitch he saw back up the middle for an RBI single. Elijiah Eusebio added a solo home run in the fourth on a shot deep to left field that easily left the yard at Paul Demie Mainieri Field, and Rolando Rodriguez drove in Montes for another insurance run in the seventh.

Mater also used the Shootout to help turn around some mid-season struggles, and all throughout the tournament the Lions had found ways to win each game. Thursday night the club just struggled to string enough offense together to make the difference. While disappointed in the loss, Mater Academy Manager Mike DiRosa was pleased that his team played so well all week in all four games they played.

“I can’t complain about the way our guys played through the whole tournament against the competition we played,” DiRosa said. “We played well and we came around swinging the bats, and we had good pitching and defense. We played four really good teams, four very well-coached teams; so it was a very productive week. We faced very good competition and all you can ask for is your team to come out in a big game and have a chance to win every time. We lost 3-0, but realistically that means you are still in the ball game, especially in a high school ball game.”

Both programs came into Spring Break having struggled in district play, and needing some good momentum to take into the district tournament as a lower seed. Their Shootout performances helped each achieve that, and especially for a Cavaliers club that went 4-0 against some of the toughest teams across South Florida.

“We are very, very honored and happy to have won this tournament,” Cavaliers Manager Phil Wisser said. “We knew coming in we had an advantage in being very deep on the mound, and our pitching was awesome. We did have some timely hits and some big hits, but we just found ways. We are starting to buy in, starting to believe and starting to make adjustments. It was great competition and an outstanding tournament run by a great company in HSBN. You guys have done a great job and we are honored to be the first winners of the High School Baseball Network Shootout.”

Coral Gables is eager and excited to get back to practice this week. The team is coming together like the players know was necessary, and now it hopes the best is yet to come.

“We are still not there, and that is what I told the guys, was that we still have a lot of work to do,” Wisser said. “Early on it was a struggle and it was frustrating for everybody. It is definitely the right time to get going, and we are going to feed off of this and go back to work on Monday. We are not done. We are honored to win this tournament, but at the end of the day we have a much bigger picture in mind.”

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