Smith player of the year; joins eight other Seahawks on All-CCC baseball squad
BASEBALL ALL-CCC AWARD HISTORY
SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – The Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) announced its 2019 Baseball All-Conference Teams and major award winners Wednesday afternoon. All eight CCC schools had student-athletes recognized on this year's list. CCC Regular-Season Champion Western New England had the most selections with 11.
Salve Regina's Zack Smith (New Canaan, Conn.) took home one of the major awards as he was voted as the Player of the Year. The Roger Williams battery of Connor Hewlette (Deer Park, N.Y.) and Chris Bosco (North Andover, Mass.) was also recognized with Hewlette earning the Pitcher of the Year honor and Bosco receiving the Defensive Player of the Year selection. Nichols freshman Brendan Duffy (Stratford, Conn.) was the Rookie of the Year and WNE's Bob Hamel (Southwick, Mass.) was the CCC Scholar-Athlete. Golden Bears' head coach Dan Gomez picked up his third Coach of the Year award in four years, while Wentworth earned the Team Sportsmanship award.
Voting for the All-CCC teams and each of the major awards was conducted by the conference's eight baseball head coaches following the conclusion of the regular season.
Smith, Hewlette, and Bosco were also recognized as members of the All-CCC First Team. However, it was the Golden Bears who dominated the First Team selections with six student-athletes garnering the honor. They were starting pitcher Kevin Hummer(Shrewsbury, Mass.), relief pitcher Sean Halligan (North Branford, Conn.), first basemanZac Nussbaum (Bridgewater, Mass.), shortstop Alex Loparco (Riverside, Conn.), outfielder Erik Lacaire (Worcester, Mass.), and designated hitter Joe Cassella(Wallingford, Conn.). Hewlette and Bosco had two other Hawks teammates joining them on the All-CCC First Team as second baseman Danny Roth (West Hartford, Conn.) and outfielder Justin Stone (Blackstone, Mass.) both earned spots. Endicott had two First Team selections with starting pitcher Kevin Gould (Rollinsford, N.H.) and utility player Matt Bald(De Pere, Wisc.) getting the honor. Nichols' Christian Naccari (Ossining, N.Y.) rounded out the First Team at third base.
The Bision's Duffy and the Golden Bears' Hamel were two of the four All-CCC pitchers selected to the Second Team. Joining them was Salve's Will Ginsberg (Sharon, Mass.) and Endicott's Zachary Sultar (South Windsor, Conn.). The Hawks' Craig Demers (Acushnet, Mass.) was the Second Team selection out of the bullpen. Two catchers earned All-CCC Second Team honors with the Seahawks' Dylan Ketch (Clinton, Conn.) taking one spot and WNE's Brian Valeriano (Stratford, Conn.) taking the other. In the Second Team infield were first baseman Kyle Bouchard (Fall River, Mass.) from Nichols, second baseman Christian Allaire (Sandown, N.H.) from Endicott, third baseman Aaron Rios (Stratford, Conn.) from Western New England, and shortstop Madden Ward (Clinton, Conn.) from Salve Regina. There were four outfielders to claim the Second Team title. They were the Bison's Joe Assenza (Poughkeepsie, N.Y.), the Gulls' Dan Cacciola (Saugus, Mass.), the Hawks' Eli Camner (Hamden, Conn.), and the Golden Bears' Ben LaCroix (Branford, Conn.). Rounding out the All-CCC Second Team was utility player Jared Keller (Oxford, Conn.) from Curry and designated hitter Tristan Dacey (Wyckoff, N.J.) from Salve Regina.
There were 16 players named to the All-CCC Third Team with four of them coming from Salve Regina. The Seahawks Third Team selections were starting pitcher Patrick Maybach (Saunderstown, R.I.), first baseman Sean O'Malley (Darien, Conn.), second baseman Anthony Cieszko (Woodcliff Lake, N.J.),and outfielder Michael DeFusco (East Greenwich, R.I.). Roger Williams had three All-CCC Third Teamers named with starting pitcher Justin Garcia (Foxborough, Mass.), third baseman Anthony Dominguez (Chester, N.J.), and outfielder Joey Gulino (Meriden, Conn.) all earning spots. Catcher Dylan Ketterer(Plymouth, Mass.) and DH Jason Leonard (Dedham, Mass.) were Curry's two Third Team selections. Gordon and Wentworth also had two Third Team choices with outfielder Chris Leavitt (East Bridgewater, Mass.) and utility player Mike Oley (Barkhamsted, Conn.) representing the Fighting Scots and shortstop Aidan French (Chicago, Ill.) and outfielder Ross Golebiewski (Lyme, Conn.) representing the Leopards. Endicott, Nichols, and WNE each had one Third Team selection to wrap up the All-Conference list. The Gulls were represented by relief pitcher Cooper Anibal (Bedford, N.H.), the Bison were represented by second baseman Nathaniel Cormier (Sandisfield, Mass.), and the Golden Bears were represented by starter Paul Wetmore (Hamden, Conn.).
Smith was one of the best hitters in the league this year, leading the conference in number of categories this year. He finished the regular season first in hits (56), double (13), home runs (8), total bases (97), batting average (.438), and slugging percentage (.758). His batting average (20th) and slugging (23rd) numbers were also in the top 25 in all of Division III. Smith was also second in the CCC in RBI (38) and on-base percentage (.473), while scoring the league's third most runs (35). He reached safely in all but two games and recorded hits in 28 contests, including a 21-game hit streak. He had 20 multi-hit games, including three four-hit performances. He was picked as the CCC Player of the Week in the week ending April 7.
Cirella continued: "Overall to have nine guys on All-CCC is tremendous. I don't know each teams exact totals but it looked like we had the second most of any team. It's been a weird year with a lot of injuries and rain and what not, but now that part of the season is over. I am hopeful we can refocus and try to put together another strong week of baseball and have a chance to contend for a championship. Talking with all of the league coaches, the consensus is there are three or four teams who can get hot and win it. Maybe a fortuitous bounce or call has us in that mix. It's just nice to put the stats and accolades away and remember that playoff heroes carry as much weight in this region as MVPs and Hall of Famers."