Capital One (Fontainebleau High) battled Anytime Fitness (Pearl River High) Thursday night at the Bone Yard, securing an exciting 3-2 come-from-behind victory in 10 innings. Capital One (11-2) earned its sixth consecutive victory. Earlier in the summer they had a five-game winning streak after losing their first contest.

With the game tied 2-2 after regulation play, Capital One manufactured a run in the bottom of the 10th off of Anytime Fitness reliever Brad Huff (0-1). Huff struck out the first hitter in the inning, but Logan Peterson ripped a double on a 0-1 pitch and was replaced by courtesy runner Dalton LaFrance. Facing a 2-2 count, David Fiegel beat out an infield single to deep short, moving LaFrance over to third. With Ryan Casassa at the plate, Fiegel then stole second. Huff threw a strike to Casassa. On the second pitch, he lifted a fly ball to right fielder Corey Funel, who made the catch and fired the ball in with LaFrance streaking to the plate. The ball was cutoff near the pitcher’s mound, allowing him to score the game-winner.

Casassa said he was just looking for a hitable pitch and talked about his 10th inning sacrifice fly.

Capital One base runner David Fiegel (18) is tagged out by Anytime Fitness catcher Michael Beloso during the second inning of Thursday's game. Fiegel attempted to make his way home from third after a teammate attempted to steal second base. (Staff Photo by Mike Pervel)

“With a guy on third and just one out, I was just trying to get him in by putting the ball in play. I got a fastball on the outside part of the plate. I was able to get the sac fly to finish the game,” Casassa said.

Peterson (1-0) earned the victory in relief, getting one out in the ninth and pitching a scoreless 10th.

Capital One coach Mo Altazan said both teams failed to get key hits.

“We didn’t capitalize on the bases. We had several opportunities late in the game. We came through in the end. It was an ugly victory, but we will take it,” Altazan said.

Anytime Fitness (2-5) took a 1-0 lead in the top of the third off of Capital One starter Addison Melancon, who went three innings. Starting pitcher Andro Cutura, who also went three innings, reached on an error and stole second. Jordan Piniero reached on a fielder’s choice with Cutura advancing to third. Doug Conravey was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Anytime Fitness cleanup hitter Michael Beloso hit a sacrifice fly to left, scoring Cutura with the first run. Melancon struck out the next hitter before giving up a walk to Beau Crawford to reload the bases. Melancon retired the next hitter on a pop up to first to strand the three runners to keep the game at 1-0.

Capital One reliever Harrison Little replaced Melancon in the fourth. In the fifth, Anytime Fitness’ Piniero hit a bloop single to right to open the inning. He moved to second on a wild pitch followed by a walk to Conravey.

Capital One reliever Anthony LaGuardia replaced Little at that point. Beloso grounded out to second with both runners advancing. Alex Foil reached on a fielder’s choice grounder and error by the second baseman with Piniero scoring to make it 2-1. With Crawford at the plate, Conravey was caught between third and home in a run down and was tagged out by LaGuardia, while trying to make it back to third base. Crawford was hit by a pitch and Huff also reached after being hit by a pitch to reload the bases. Funel hit into a 6-4 fielder’s choice grounder, forcing Huff at second to strand the runners. LaGuardia went four innings, registering six strikeouts. He struck out the side in the eighth. He hit two batters in the fifth, but was able to work out of the jam.

Altazan praised the relief effort of Laguardia.

“Anthony has done a really good job this summer. He has a real effective curveball and is able to keep hitters off balance,” Altazan said.

After being limited to just two hits and held scoreless in the first six innings, Capital One finally broke through in the seventh inning. Matt Ernst walked to open the frame. Foil took the hill, taking over for Conravey. Ernst moved to second on a throwing error by the catcher and that miscue was followed by the center fielder making an errant throw back in to third, which allowed Ernst to score to cut the lead to 2-1. LaGuardia singled and moved around to third on two wild pitches. Jake Palmisano walked and stole second. Melancon came through with a sacrifice fly to left, plating LaGuardia to tie things at 2-2. Palmisano was gunned down at third by catcher Beloso after he attempted to steal third when the ball bounded away at home plate. Andrew Patin followed with a single, but Foil retired the next hitter on a fly ball to center.

It then became a contest of will as the game entered extra innings.

Anytime Fitness’ Huff took over in the eighth and pitched two scoreless innings before running into trouble in the 10th.

Anytime Fitness coach Steve Bullock said his club’s failure to get hits with runners in scoring position was the difference.

“I think we had the bases loaded three times and weren’t able to come through with hits. I feel like if we could have gotten some of those hits early on, it could have been a six or seven run game,” Bullock said. “Our defense played well. They (Capital One) ran themselves out of some innings, which helped us out. Maybe they tried to be a little too aggressive on the bases.”