PHILADELPHIA — Sergio Droz got the Tri-Cape off to a good start in the Carpenter Cup semifinals Tuesday afternoon.
Zach Maxwell made sure Tri-Cape finished strong.
Tri-Cape advanced to its fourth straight Carpenter Cup final with a 6-3 win over Delaware County at Citizens Bank Park, the home of the Phillies. Tri-Cape will meet Inter-AC/Independents of Pennsylvania for the championship at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Phillies' ballpark.
“It’s awesome,” Droz said of playing at Citizens Bank Park. “Big leaguers get to do it every day. It felt cool to get up there and do what they do. I can't even describe it. It was just different.”
Droz, a Millville graduated senior, started on the mound and threw three hitless innings with two strikeouts. Maxwell, a 2024 Delsea graduate, knocked in the winning run with a safety squeeze bunt in the bottom of the eighth.
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The Carpenter Cup is an all-star tournament run by the Phillies that features 16 teams from New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware. It began in 1986 and is named after former Phillies owners Bob and Ruly Carpenter. Tri-Cape, which won the title in 2021 and 2022 and lost in the final last season, consists of all-stars from the Cape-Atlantic League and Tri-County Conference.
Droz wore Mike Trout’s No. 1 for Millville this past high school season. Each year the Thunderbolts select a player to wear it.
“That meant a lot,” Droz said. “Got to meet Mike Trout. It was just an awesome experience.”
Droz, who will continue his education and baseball career at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, batted .375 and was a standout on the mound with a 2.06 ERA and 44 strikeouts in 37 ⅓ innings.
On Tuesday, Droz said all three of his pitches — fastball, slider and changeup — were working. Before he threw a pitch, Droz said, “I took a few seconds to soak everything in."
Maxwell stepped to the plate with runners on second and third with one out and the score 3-3. There was probably no better player on Tri-Cape roster to execute a squeeze. Delsea is famed for its “small-ball” style. The Tri-Cape coaches let Maxwell know they were going to squeeze if there was a runner on third with less than two outs.
“That’s what we do all year at Delsea,” Maxwell said. “It’s second nature to me.”
He squared to bunt on the first pitch, but the ball was outside. He successfully executed the bunt on the second pitch, scoring Hunter Ray of Lower Cape May Regional.
“You just want to get it down because if you don’t get it down, you have no chance,” Maxwell said. “I was lucky enough to get it down, and Hunter Ray got a great jump.”
With the win, the Tri-Cape players get another day at Citizens Bank. One of the event’s thrills is the chance to compete in a major league ballpark.
Inter-Ac/Independents consists primarily of players from the Inter-Academic and Friends leagues in Philadelphia and its suburbs. Inter-Ac beat Jersey Shore 5-4 in Tuesday’s other semifinal.
“It’s been fun,” Droz said. “We have a good team over here. Coming back here to play again, there’s nothing better than this.”
The semifinals were scheduled for Monday but postponed one day due to wet field conditions.
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