BEACHWOOD — The Beachwood baseball team delivered a complete performance on Tuesday, using steady offense and a dominant outing on the mound to secure an 8-0 shutout win over Fairview and complete a Chagrin Valley Conference Metro Division sweep.
“I think, in general, with this team this year, it’s a different feel,” said Beachwood head coach Matt Lamovec. “We’re really playing one-through-nine baseball. You see it in the box score today, everybody through the lineup is hitting the baseball. They’re picking each other up on defense. So we’ve put a lot of focus this year on teamwork and just playing complementary baseball, and they’ve really bought into the process this year. I would attribute that to a big part of our success thus far.”
That balance showed early.
Beachwood struck first in the opening inning, capitalizing on a two-out, two-run single to grab a 2-0 lead. The Bison added on in the second when Highley Devine delivered an RBI single to extend the advantage to 3-0.
Jonah Greller manufactured a run in the third, reaching base and advancing all the way around on passed balls to make it 4-0 after three innings.
The Bison continued to apply pressure in the fifth. Gavi Lappen singled and moved to third before scoring on a Caleb White RBI hit. Nico Medina followed with a sacrifice fly, pushing the lead to 6-0.
Beachwood put the game out of reach in the sixth when White lined a two-out, two-run single to left, capping the scoring at 8-0.
On the mound, Lappen controlled the game from start to finish. The senior tossed a complete-game shutout, allowing just three hits and one walk while striking out five.
The win also showed growth from the previous day, when Beachwood defeated Fairview 7-5 despite defensive miscues.
“We embrace the win,” Lamovec said. “We enjoy it for the moment, and then as soon as we leave the postgame meeting, it’s on to the next one, because as soon as you start celebrating too much, worrying about what happened today, you’re going to forget about tomorrow. You’re going to get yourself in trouble. Fairview is a team that has some players over there, some solid players. They can hit a little bit, so if we don’t come out ready to go, they could jump on us. We put a very big emphasis on taking the win in the moment, moving on to the next game, and coming out ready to play that.”
Beachwood travels to West Geauga on April 16, while Fairview heads to Oberlin on Friday.
Top Players
Beachwood
- Gavi Lappen: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 5 K; 2-for-4, 2 R
- Caleb White: 2-for-4, 3 RBI, 1 R
- Jonah Greller: 2-for-3, 2 RBI, 1 R
- Highley Devine: 2-for-3, RBI, 2 R
- Nico Medina: Sacrifice fly (RBI)
- Henry Strean: 1 hit
- Ethan Malek: 1 hit
Fairview
- Nathan Clark: 1 hit
- Tyler Hayes: 1 hit
- Carter Reagan: 1 hit
