BURLINGTON, VT — The Lake Monsters scored five times in the bottom of the fifth inning to erase a three-run deficit and Nick Kelly tossed five scoreless innings of relief to lead Vermont to a 9-4 victory over the New Britain Bees in Futures League action Friday night at historic Centennial Field.
Kelly (South Burlington/Fairfield) came on in relief of starter Brody Shawn (Wake Forest) to start the fifth inning. After a 1-2-3 fifth, he worked around back-to-back singles to leadoff the sixth and a walk/fielding error to open the seventh. After a one-out infield single and walk in the ninth, he got a game-ending 4-6-3 double play to complete the five scoreless innings on three hits with two walks and three strikeouts.
Vermont trailed 4-1 in the fourth inning when Jake Gaudreau (Bryant) lined a two-run homer to right to narrow the deficit to one run before the Lake Monsters sent nine batters to the plate in the five-run fifth.
After back-to-back one-out walks, Zander Teator (Babson) tied the game with a line drive double to right. Two batters later with the bases loaded, Gaudreau put Vermont in the lead with an RBI groundout and Jackson Sirois (Virginia) followed with an RBI single to left. Tyler Favretto (Kansas Wesleyan) capped the inning with a two-run double to rightcenter.
The Lake Monsters added another run in the seventh on a Wyatt Patchett (Le Moyne) RBI double that scored Teator, who had led the inning with his third hit and then scored his third run of the contest.
MONSTER PERFORMANCES
- Kelly (W) 5 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 SO
- Gaudreau 1-for-3, BB2 R, HR, 3 RBI
- Teator 3-for4, 3 R, 2B, RBI
MONSTER HIGHLIGHTS
- Mark Quatrani (Cornell) was 3-for-5 with an RBI triple in the 3rd inning that tied game 1-1
- Favretto had 2 walks and a hit by pitch to go along with his 2-run double (has 89 walks and 89 base hits in 115 career games with Vermont)
- Shawn allowed four runs on six hits over his four innings to start the game
- Kelly is the 1st Vermont reliever to throw at least 5 innings since fellow Vermont Luke Reiner (Williston) went 5 ⅓ innings June 18, 2022 at New Britain
BEYOND BOXSCORE
- 5th inning marked the 3rd time that Vermont has scored a season-high 5 runs in an inning (last time was June 19th vs. Westfield)
- Gaudreau homer was the 15th of the season for Vermont, while 10 different Lake Monster players have now hit a home run this season
- Vermont (17-15) hosts 1st-place Westfield (19-11-1) for a 2-game series Saturday 6:05pm and Sunday 5:05pm
Next Game: Saturday July 6th, 6:05pm vs. Westfield (Expos Night)
Broadcast Info: Streaming on FCBLnetwork.com and live on WYCI-TV