MONTGOMERY COUNTY GAZETTE

“Still Ship-shape”

Good Counsel standout one of seven County products in all-star showcase

South All-Stars 10, North All-Stars 9

by James Peters

Staff Writer

Gazette News

Before Saturday’s appearance, the last time rising Good Counsel High senior Collin Stevens stepped on the University of Maryland’s Shipley Field, he played a huge part in one of his school’s greatest comebacks.

Trailing 11-3 late in its Washington Catholic Athletic Conference baseball championship contest with Paul VI (Va.) last May, the Falcons rallied for a 14-12 victory over the Panthers for the program’s first league title in 15 years.

Stevens, a Burtonsville resident, recorded the final five outs on the mound in that game for his second save of what was a rough season for Good Counsel, which finished in fifth place during regular season play.

Stevens was part of another such rally Sunday during the Mid-Atlantic High School Baseball Classic at Shipley Field. His North All-Stars erased a 7-1 deficit with seven runs in the bottom of the fifth inning. Stevens singled to center field to load the bases and then scored on a three-run triple by Centennial’s Austin Harclerode. Calvert Hall’s Reid Chenworth followed three batters later with a two-run home run.

The South All-Stars, which included two players from that same Paul VI squad, eventual won 10-9 with a run in the top of the ninth inning to capture the 4^th Annual “Battle on the Ship.”

“This field, it brought back memories coming back to it,” Stevens said. “We had another comeback, only we couldn’t finish it off this time.”

Despite the loss, Stevens and three other Montgomery County residents on the North squad —Kevin Fuqua (Avalon), Curtis Wilson (St. Andrew’s) and Brett Hammann (Covenant Life) — accomplished what they were there for: to showcase their individual skills in front of a host of college coaches, including Maryland’s Terry Rupp and Towson’s Mike Gottlieb.

The Mid-Atlantic High School Baseball Classic is actually a two-day event. It started with a combine Friday that allowed 200 glove-toting college hopefuls to display their individual games for nearly 30 scouts.

Lou Holcomb, the event’s founder and a part-time scout for the Baltimore Orioles, along with college and high school coaches, selects the top 40 players at the combine tom competed in Sunday’s game. Twenty players from Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Delaware form the North team; 20 from Virginia, Washington, D.C. and North Carolina form the South.

“The combine was great,” Holcomb said. “We had a good turnout. We had almost 30 colleges here for the event. There’s a ton of [Division I] talent here. It’s an event that’s been growing each year. We have to get a little bit better each year.”

Well over 30 players from Montgomery County tried out, including St. John’s players Zack Feierstein (Bethesda), Hugh Adams (Bethesda) and Dimitri Deoudes (Darnestown). Those three players were placed on the South squad. Holcomb decided to use the Maryland-D.C. border as the demarcation line to separate the teams, even though ballplayers who compete in the county worked out with the South team Friday and normally play for the South.

Stevens showed his versatility Sunday, playing in both center and left fields after spending his first two varsity seasons with Good Counsel on the left side of the infield. His summer coach placed Stevens in the outfield this summer to make use of the speed he displayed as a wide receiver last fall for Falcons football coach Bob Milloy.

Stevens, who batted .341 with 19 runs batted in this past spring, went 1 for 3 at the plate Sunday. He drove an offering from Fauquier’s Cassidy McDaniel right up the middle to load the bases in the fifth inning, helping fuel the North’s seven-run rally. The South eventually won on a double to left field by North Stafford’s Matt Johns in the top of the ninth off North hurler Tommy Winegardner (Riverdale Baptist).

“This is great,” Stevens said. “I’ve gone to a lot of stuff like this over the summer, like showcases, and you just show your skills. I think it’s a good thing. A lot of coaches show up.” Fuqua, Wilson, Hammann gain valuable exposure.

While Stevens is probably already on the radar screens of the numerous college scouts who closely follow the talent-rich WCAC, the event was a coming-out party for Fuqua, Wilson and Hammann, who play for smaller schools in lesser-known conferences. Fuqua, a hard-throwing right-handed pitcher who topped out at 90 miles per hour during the combine, plays for Avalon, a school that enjoyed its first varsity season in 2006 after two years as a junior varsity program. The Black Knights played an independent schedule last spring.

“This is great,” said Fuqua, a Rockville native who went 9-3 with a 0.83 earned-run average and 120 strikeouts this past spring. “I’d love to do this every year if I could. I think I got a lot of exposure. I think it’s good that I came.”

Wilson, a ruggedly-built middle infielder from Silver Spring, guided a young St. Andrew’s squad to the Mid-Atlantic Conference tournament semifinals this past spring, compiling a plus .400 batting average. The Lions finished 7-11 overall and 3-9 in conference play.

“The exposure has been amazing,” Wilson said. “I’m from a small school — 450 students including middle school. It’s been great to play against great competition. Lou did a great job. I thought I did well. I held my own.”

Hammann has attended Covenant Life, a small Christian school in the player’s native Gaithersburg, since the first grade. The Cougars play in the Potomac Valley Athletic Conference, a collection of numerous small private schools around the area, including county-based Jewish Day, Hebrew Academy and Sandy Spring Friends.

“Going to a small school, it’s not jealousy, but you wish you could get a little more exposure,” Hammann said. “This is the first time since high school that I’ve been able to get in with a lot of the East Coast talent. Hopefully, I get some more opportunities like this in the future.”

All three made the most of their opportunities Sunday, although Fuqua believes he could have pitched better. He allowed two unearned runs during his one inning of work, the fifth. Wilson nearly ended that inning with a 6-3 double play, but as he went to throw to first base, he was undercut and his throw got past the first baseman and under the fence in foul territory.

“I wasn’t really myself out there,” said Fuqua, who ended the inning with a strikeout. “I wasn’t following through. I definitely could have done better, I think.” Hammann, a third baseman/pitcher, went 0 for 2 with two strikeouts at the plate but he worked a perfect seventh inning on the mound, including a strikeout of Johns.

“[The opposing pitchers] were throwing pretty hard today,” he said. “It caught me a little off-guard. It was a good team effort. We almost pulled it off. I wish we could have come out with the victory, but everybody played well.”

Wilson started at second base and also saw time at shortstop. At the plate, he collected a single in two at-bats and was at bat when Spalding’s Paul DeVito was thrown out trying to steal second with two out in the bottom of the ninth.

“I thought I did well,” said Wilson, who earned the North’s Top Hitter Award for power during Friday’s combine. “I wouldn’t change anything I did. I just wish I would have gotten my last at-bat. That’s OK. I had a great time.”