TAMPA - The Terriers saved their best for last. With the White division title and a spot in the quarterfinals of the Saladino Tournament at stake, senior Michael Garcia pitched a complete game five-hitter Tuesday as Hillsborough slipped past Sickles 3-2.
"Mike's an A-plus, frontline starter," Hillsborough coach Pat Russo said. "I'd want him pitching any game where it's on the line."
The Terriers (8-4) play at 10 a.m. today against Red division winner Plant.
An unearned run in the top of the sixth allowed Sickles (7-6) to tie it. Two errors put runners on first and third with one out and Daniel Dwyer, who knocked in his first team's run with a second-inning double, singled past a diving Chris Noriega at third base to tie it at 2. Garcia then picked up two ground balls to finish the frame.
Hillsborough responded as Noriega, who committed one of the two errors in the sixth, sliced a triple just inside the right-field line past a diving Josh Langston. Two batters later, freshman Todd Brazeal smacked a tailing liner to center, deep enough to bring home Noriega with the winner.
Brazeal singled home the Terriers' first run in the second when Hillsborough took a 2-1 edge.
Sickles' Jared Stephenson bounced a double inside the first-base line leading off the top of the seventh. A sacrifice moved him to third, but Garcia stymied the Gryphons. With the infield in, he coaxed a weak grounder to shortstop Devon Cason to hold the runner and watched Carlos De La Paz's fly ball settle into right fielder T.J. Alonzo's glove for the final out.
For Sickles, the back-to-back Saladino champs in 2001-02, it was the second one-run defeat to the Terriers this season.
In a game between teams that came in winless in pool play, Freedom scored four in the sixth to defeat Plant City 4-2.
