Aquinas' Anthony Ciscar allows one hit in shutout of Flanagan in baseball opener

FORT LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA – Starting pitching, they say, sets the tone. Anthony Ciscar certainly did that for St. Thomas Aquinas on Monday night in a 10-0 victory over Flanagan in the Broward County Athletic Association tournament.

The junior, who has already committed to the University of Miami, gave up one hit and struck out 10 in 5.2 innings. 

Cash Clementi had two doubles and an RBI, while Ryan Wolf had a run-scoring single and a triple for a balanced St. Thomas attack.

“It was an impressive game,” Raiders coach Joey Wardlow said. “On the mound, pitching, defense. The hitting tonight was good. It was the first night out. 

"Flanagan is a very good team. We know we’re going to see them again, and they’re going to get better as the season goes along. We’re going to try to build on what we did tonight, and try to keep getting better. Try to keep getting the same kind of pitching and defense. When the hitting is there, it’s going to be good.”

St. Thomas, from Class 6A-District 14, is now 1-1 and will next play in the BCAA tournament on Wednesday against an undetermined opponent. 

Flanagan (0-1) is in Class 7A-District 14. The Falcons will get another meeting at St. Thomas in non-district action on March 30.

“We look at this one, and what I told them was, ‘We weren’t going 25-0, for sure,’“ Flanagan coach Noel Figueroa said. “We’ve just got to play better. We’ve got a little bit more into it as the game progressed.”

The game turned lopsided in favor of St. Thomas, and the highlights were:

* Near no-hitter for Ciscar: After a bumpy first inning, where Ciscar walked two, the right-hander settled and got stronger as the game progressed. 

Flanagan threatened in the first inning, drawing back-to-back two-out walks by Daniel Perez and Brayden Allison. But Ciscar got out of the brewing jam by inducing a groundout. From there, the Falcons’ chances were limited.

“Really, it was just getting comfortable on the mound,” Ciscar said. “Just getting used to the game. Kind of getting a feel for everything. Just getting comfortable moving, pounding the zone. Just getting into that tempo. Getting that rhythm: throwing strikes and making pitches, with confidence.”

Ciscar carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning, when St. Thomas was comfortably ahead by nine runs. The junior struck out the first two batters in the sixth inning. But the no-hit bid ended when the left-handed hitting Allison sliced a double to left field. 

Working on a pitch count of roughly 85, Ciscar was replaced, as he exited to a nice applause from the home crowd. His teammates greeted him just outside the dugout. 

Nico Ratel preserved the one-hitter by striking out the lone batter he faced. Since St. Thomas added a run in the sixth inning to make it a 10-run margin, the game ended at that point via the run-rule.

“I had [a no-hitter] once, and I was really hoping for one tonight,” Ciscar said. “I think it was in eighth grade.”Ciscar felt more confident as the game progressed.

“I felt comfortable,” he said. “Everything was getting loose. The whole thing came together at the end.”

A year ago, Flanagan had good success against Ciscar. It was a different story on Monday.

“We were on him early,” Figueroa said. “We didn’t get any hits. We had guys on. We had some traffic on the bases but we didn’t do our job. We struck out too many times and we let him get going. The same kid pitched against us last year, and he didn’t last 2-1/3 innings, but we had a different hitting team last year. This year, we’re younger. A lot of immaturity we’ve got to work through, but we’ll get better as the season goes.” 

* Big innings, big at-bats for Raiders: St. Thomas broke the game open with three runs in the fourth inning, making it 8-0. The inning was highlighted by three-straight doubles.

Junior center fielder Christian Hamilton, a Miami commit, delivered an RBI double to deep left field, barely missing a home run. A.J. Groeneveld and R.J. Machado followed with run-scoring doubles in the big inning.

Overall, St. Thomas had nice approaches and delivered in key spots.“We’re going to continue to work on some stuff,” Wardlow said. “We have some things to work on and we’ll get that done in practices, and as we see different types of pitchers, we’ll have the approach hopefully ready.”

Machado is committed to Florida State.

* Run at your own risk on Flanagan’s catcher: Falcons’ catcher Daniel Perez is a standout defensively. The senior has an above-average pop-time and throwing release for a high school catcher. According to the Flanagan coaching staff, Perez’s pop time is between 1.82 and 1.90 seconds. 

Perez was able to showcase that quick release in the second inning when he threw out Pavlos Pieraskis, who attempted to steal second base after drawing a leadoff walk. 

The Flanagan staff has so much confidence in Perez behind the plate that he is allowed to call the pitches. This is rare in high school, where the coaches often signal the signs from the dugout. P

erez is committed to the University of New Orleans. At the plate, he has some power potential as well.