Taylor leads Kings Park to county A title
Kings Park's Nicole Tortlincasi (center), #10 Paige Julich, pitcher #9 Lindsay Taylor and #18 Reina Tortlincasi celebrate their 8-2 victory over Sayville. (June 2, 2011) Credit: Bob Mitchell
Kings Park is finally county royalty thanks to some majestic hitting and the Queen of Suffolk pitching.
Lindsay Taylor, who earlier this season became Suffolk's all-time leader in wins and strikeouts, allowed three hits and one walk with 12 strikeouts in Game 2 Thursday, leading No. 1 Kings Park to an 8-2 win over No. 2 Sayville to clinch the program's first Suffolk Class A championship.
Nicole Torlincasi, who went 3-for-4 with three runs, hit a triple in the top of the fourth inning and scored the go-ahead run on Ariana Ambrosio's single to give Kings Park a 3-2 lead. Taylor added an RBI single in the fifth, then took second on a wild pitch and immediately came home on an overthrow to the pitcher.
With the bases loaded in the seventh, eighth-grader Cheyenne Giarraputo sealed the win with a three-run triple.
"We really wanted it this year," Torlincasi said. "We knew it wasn't going to come easy and we just did what we had to do."
After Reina Torlincasi hit an RBI single in the first inning, Kathleen Maehr and Cindy Griffin each singled in a run in the bottom of the inning as Sayville (16-8) took a 2-1 lead. But from there, Taylor would allow only an infield single.
Kings Park (22-2) advances to play Seaford (13-6) in the Long Island Class A championship at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday at Bellport Martha Avenue Field.
"This was definitely a team effort," Taylor said. "It was my favorite game ever. It's just unbelievable that we did it."
