Riverhead baseball makes playoffs for second consecutive year

The Riverhead varsity baseball team came into its final regular-season game this year sporting a 9-8 Division I record and just one win away from making the playoffs.

Already using their ace in Matt Zambriski for a game one series win against Patchogue-Medford on Monday, the ball was handed over to sophomore Jason Davis to try to do something Riverhead hasn’t done in 17 years — notch a playoff berth in two consecutive seasons.

“Me and Jason had first period together,” Zambriski said. “We talked about the game today, and I knew he was going to shove as soon as he walked into the building. He’s just the kind of guy that has the mentality to go out there and get the job done.”

Davis stood on business and threw six innings, allowing only two hits and one earned run while striking out six to lead Riverhead to a 7-3 victory and the privilege of extending their season into the postseason.

Riverhead had a tumultuous year. It all started in the preseason when they got word that their No. 2 and No. 3 arms in the rotation went down with an arm injuries. It could have been instant panic mode for the Blue Waves, but not this group.

“We had guys step into roles that were new to them,” Riverhead head coach Kevin Kerman said. “Credit to those guys. They did what they had to do for the team this season, and not only that, they found tremendous success that even shocked us as coaches.”

Davis finished with 29.2 innings pitched, 29 strikeouts, and a 1.416 ERA. Brayden Williamson, who finished the game on Thursday and earned the save, filled the other vacant spot in the rotation and threw 28 innings this season with 36 strikeouts and a 2.074 ERA. Solid production for two players that weren’t meant to be anything more than relief arms this season.

The Blue Waves knew that their No. 1 Zambriski was going to give them a chance to win every time out, but to make the playoffs, that wasn’t going to be enough. The St. John’s University commit lived up to every expectation this season, throwing 36.1 innings with 69 strikeouts and a 0.963 ERA.

To even get to this point, Riverhead had to come up with some big wins against top opponents in the division. Following a three-game sweep at the end of April by William Floyd, where the Blue Waves were unable to score a single run, the season’s outlook was bleak. Playoffs began to look like a long shot.

“We had a long meeting after that series,” Kerman said. “I felt like the effort wasn’t there. That wasn’t the brand of baseball we’ve been preaching. We kind of gave up on ourselves in that series. But I think going through that made us closer and stronger as a group.”

Riverhead needed to win four out of the next six games to make the playoffs against Walt Whitman and Patchogue-Medford, and did just that.

The win on Thursday even came with its share of adversity. The Raiders instantly put the pressure on Riverhead, putting up two runs in the top of the first. The team could have folded, but instead scored four runs in the bottom half of the inning and followed that up with a three-run spot in the bottom of the second.

JJ Perez had a two-RBI double in the first and a two-RBI triple in the second.

The left fielder batted .345 this season.

“I think it comes with all the practice that we do,” Perez said. “The early mornings, the late nights, it prepares us for moments like these.”

Zambriski and Davis both had two hits in the victory and hold the highest batting averages on the team with .431 and .381, respectively. 

“We lost guys to injuries, and we lost guys that just quit the team this year. We dealt with a lot,” Davis said. “But all it did was make us closer as a group. We got what we got out there, and we had to make the best out of it and put good at-bats together and play good baseball.”

Before last year’s playoff appearance, the varsity baseball team missed the playoffs for 10 consecutive seasons. To make it two years in a row is a sign of the changing tide in Riverhead.

“We set out every season with the mentality to make the playoffs,” Kerman said. “It’s not a hope anymore. It’s an expectation. Yeah, we dealt with some stuff this year, but we never stopped fighting. That’s what Riverhead baseball is all about now and will continue to be.”