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By A.L. HUBBARD; Times Leader Sports Correspondent
Saturday, May 01, 1993 Page: 1C QUICK WORDS: BRADSHAW HURLS GAR PAST
HAFEY
WILKES-BARRE — The Bishop Hafey Vikings visited Coal Street Park Friday,
hoping to take home a win against the GAR Grenadiers. But GAR senior pitcher
Ken Bradshaw would have none of that.
Bradshaw struck out a career-high 14 and walked only two as GAR posted a
7-3 Wyoming Valley Conference victory.
“Kenny pitched a dynamite game,” said GAR coach Simon Peters.
“The curveball worked a lot better; the fastball, location was a lot better
than usual,” said Bradshaw. “I felt like I threw the ball a lot harder today
than normal. I pitched Tuesday and couldn’t get the curveball over at all, but
it worked a lot better today and helped us out a lot.”
Despite the near perfect pitching, Hafey senior Frank Defalco hit a triple
in the first inning and doubled home Toby Harris in the seventh. Defalco said,
“`We hit the ball a litle today…Runs hurt again, and they’re usually scoring
their runs by walks…If we cut down on the walks, we’ll be close.” The
Vikings cut their deficit to 4-2 deficit in the sixth inning when Matt Dudeck
singled home Defalco and Mike Merrick, who was pinch-running for Matt Shupp.
But when the Grenadiers stepped to bat in the sixth inningthey hammered in
three more runs, building their lead to 7-2. Billy Cook went to first on an
error, Jay Slavish drove him in with a triple and then came home when Jay Pius
doubled.
GAR won its second game of the season against five defeats.
“It’s good to get our second win of the season because we have been
struggling, we haven’t been playing well early in the season, and I think some
of our kids were starting to question their abilities,” said Peters. “And this
was, I believe, a good confidence builder for the kids. And hopefully maybe
this can be the start of a winning streak.”
The Hafey Vikings are now 2-4, and although their record doesn’t please
coach Norm Dudeck, he remains upbeat about the season.
“We walked too many people the last two games,” he said. “Too many walks,
too many people left on base. We’re not getting the key hit, once we do we’ll
start to win a few games.”
Bishop Hafey senior Eric Shupp was also optimistic despite the loss.
“Today we looked OK, and we started hitting the ball and playing a little
bit better defense,” he said.
Boxscore
— Page 4C