Chabad of Five Towns Wins Baseball Championship

Chabad of The Five Towns won the Synagogue League Finals after defeating Beth Sholom 3-0.

Avram Schreiber pitched a shutout on the way to the three run win played at Lawrence Middle School. The final followed each team’s elimination semi-final games and each team’s pitcher starting both games of their double header.

Semi-Finals

Chabad won their semi-final game 6-5 over the White Shul. They fell behind 3-0 to start the game due to fielding errors, but rallied to go ahead 5-3. After the White Shul tied the game up at five, Chabad’s David Weisman hit a walkoff single to send his team to the finals.

“The first game was a grind in and of itself because we faced a very good team,” Schreiber said. “We just eked it out 6-5 and I was wondering if I should even be out there against Beth Sholom because I left everything out on the field in that first game.”

Beth Sholom won their semi-final game 10-8 over Ahvas Yisroel, with most of White Shul’s runs coming on errors by Beth Sholom. The game was tied 7-7 going into the sixth inning when Beth Sholom loaded the bases for Neil Osrof. Osroff came through, delivering a bases clearing double to put his team up 10-7 and send his team to the finals. Yehuda Konig, the Beth Sholom pitcher had just one poor inning in which he gave up six runs.

The wins set up a match up between the two top teams in the league, with both having won a league leading six games.

Finals

In the top of the second inning, Chabad got a base runner over to third base with no one out and Rabbi Meir Geisinsky grounded out to the right side of the infield to drive in a run.

In the top of the third, Chabad scored in similar fashion. This time, Zack Hatten grounded out to second base, driving in the runner on third base with only one out on the board.

Those two runs would be more than enough, but Mark Seabag contributed an RBI single in the top of the fourth inning to increase Chabad’s lead to 3-0.

Schreiber, after pitching a long first game began to labor in the fifth inning. He was noticeably out of gas, but kept throwing strikes. Beth Sholom’s hitters made some good contact with his pitches, but most of their deep drives would find their way into the mitts of Chabad outfielders.

“I was running on fumes and I was lucky enough to throw the ball okay and find a new rhythm and the guys made all the plays,” Schreiber, who is interestingly Chairman of Beth Sholom’s Executive Board but plays for Chabad, said. “You have to take your hats off to the guys behind me. Zachariah at third base was ready to come in and he’s a fine young pitcher. I’m 46 and he’s 19, but Beth Sholom is the shul that I usually attend, so it was a little more personal.”

Schreiber went on to complete the shutout despite his fatigue and embraced his team on the mound after the final out.

“We had a really good season,” Beth Sholom’s Osrof said. “Everyone came to play but we faced a tough pitcher today and he did the job. That’s all I can say.”

“We started off a few years ago 0-7, so we’ve come a long way,” Geisinsky, Chabad’s team captain said. “Last year we played in the championship game and were blown out. This year, we didn’t get many more big players. We don’t have many great sluggers offensively. We just know that we have a good pitcher and we used that to our advantage. Any time the other team wants to score runs, they’re going to have to get hits. We don’t make errors and we don’t let anyone get a free pass on base. Avram pitched really well and we hit better than we did all season. We’re not great hitters, but we’re not easy outs either.”