Stoneman Douglas takes risk without Rojas, still advances to state final
When you’ve been through the battles the Stoneman Douglas baseball team has in recent years, you find ways to win - even without your top players.
The Eagles made the risky decision to hold back ace Gio Rojas in Friday night’s Class 7A state semifinal, in anticipation of a possible matchup in the final with Venice, the nation’s top-ranked team.
As Douglas has proven time and again, it finds a way.
Junior catcher Jackson Taylor roped a single to left field to score sophomore Ander Elorriaga and secure a 9-8 walk-off victory for the Eagles over Oviedo Hagerty. The win propelled Douglas to the state finals for a state-record sixth consecutive time.
And now the Eagles (27-6) will turn to Rojas, their University of Miami-committed, projected top 10 MLB draft pick lefty pitcher on Saturday at 5 against aforementioned Venice (32-1) in the hopes of extending their state-record state championship streak to six in a row. The Indians survived their own close call on Friday, rallying to beat Vero Beach 4-2 in their semifinal.
“We came here to win two, not one, and the seniors all came in, and we rolled the dice,” Douglas coach Todd Fitz-Gerald said. “We’re going up against the No. 1 team in the country, and we felt Gio gave us our best opportunity. It should be one for the ages.”
History isn’t the only factor motivating the Eagles.
With the game tied at 8 heading into the bottom of the seventh, one of Douglas’ assistant coaches could be heard telling the players, “Let’s do this for Colleen, boys.”
Colleen is Fitz-Gerald’s wife, who in recent months was diagnosed with brain cancer, and was back home watching the game on the livestream online. Douglas has rallied around the Fitz-Gerald family this season, supporting in numerous ways, including a GoFundMe account, which has raised over $125,000 for their medical expenses.
“My wife is fighting, and she’s at home watching…I love you, babe,” said an emotional Fitz-Gerald after the game. “This means a lot.”
The emotion Taylor showed after his heroics displayed how much the win meant to Douglas’ players, who came to Fitz-Gerald earlier in the week, along with Rojas, and convinced him to set the Eagles’ rotation the way they did.
“I normally don’t like doing that, but they said let’s roll with this,” Fitz-Gerald said. “I told them, you have to back me up then.”
They did throughout a rollercoaster of a game in which Douglas fell behind 3-0 in the first inning, and then again trailed 7-5 after three innings.
Trailing 8-6 in the fifth, Lorenzo Laurel walked to lead off the inning. Two batters later, Matt Toback singled with two outs to put runners on the corners. Hagerty reliever Noah Adkins threw a wild pitch that allowed Laurel to score. Taylor then tied the game with a double to score Toback.
In the sixth, Laurel appeared to have a double when he lined a ball down the left field line. The third base umpire called it foul. The home plate umpire called it fair. After a brief conference, they called Laurel out. Laurel was later ejected for something he said to the umpire as he left the field.
Elorriaga stepped up to the plate in his spot in the seventh and drew a key one-out walk. After moving to second on a ground out by Toback, Taylor delivered despite fouling off the first pitch and falling behind 0-2 in the count.
“I was feeling good today and I had to support my boys. I’m glad they did pitch to me. That first pitch I swung too hard and was trying to do too much,” Taylor said. “I tried to simple it down, and give it all for my team and not let them beat me.”
Douglas wouldn’t have survived without a solid recovery from its pitching from the fourth inning on.
Tyler Stertzbach entered in relief of Reid Dadic with the bases loaded and the Eagles ahead 5-4 in the top of the third.
Hagerty third baseman Shaurya Bhosale cleared the bases with a double to give the Huskies a 7-5 edge.
But Stertzbach settled in from that point on and allowed only one run on seven hits, struck out eight and walked one over five innings.
“We believe in all of our pitching,” Taylor said. “We think we can go against anyone in the country even without our best guy, and we’re going to win.”
Dadic appeared to get out of a jam in the first inning, but left fielder Angel Rodriguez dropped a pop up by Isaias Torres that could have ended the frame. Aiden Kearney then hit a line drive that Laurel dove for and missed, allowing the ball to get behind him and two more runs to score.
Taylor had an RBI single as part of a five-run second inning for Douglas, in which they took advantage of a Hagerty error and a wild pitch to take a 5-3 lead.
“The young kid Stertzbach coming in and Jackson Taylor on the barrel,” Fitz-Gerald said. “Two guys that struggled a little bit this season. What can I say about these guys, they’re just resilient. And now we get the big boys.”
