It’s not often a team can look back on a season and say it achieved all of its goals.
The Rye baseball team did just that, and then some, completing its deepest postseason run in over a decade.
“Our main goals that Coach (Mike) Bruno stresses at the beginning of the year are: win the league, win the section, beat Harrison – which we did all three,” said junior center fielder Lucas London. “Losing in the first round the last two years, it was really something that we wanted to get done, and we thought we had the pieces to do it this year. We knew that we had it if we were playing our best baseball at the right time.”
After checking off each of those three boxes, the Garnets didn’t stop there.
Rye rallied to knock off Section 2 champion La Salle 6-4 in the regional final on June 8. The month-long postseason run ended one game away from the state championship, with a 7-2 loss to Section 5 champion Pittsford Mendon in the June 13 semifinals.
While the Garnets came up short against the eventual Class A champions, the team exceeded all expectations by making it to Binghamton, the ultimate goal for all New York high school baseball teams at the start of the season. Rye finished 23-5, including a 15-game win streak following its annual spring training trip to Florida in April.
“We just play with a lot of confidence,” said senior pitcher Jack Sheridan. “Especially coming back from Florida. From that point, we knew we could play with anyone and that in any game, in any situation, we’ll still be in it. Even if someone didn’t have a good at-bat or had a bad performance, we always kept each other up and knew that we always had each other’s backs.”
The belief in themselves never wavered, even when the win streak came to an end against Panas in the section tournament. The Garnets won an elimination game against Nanuet two days later, then beat Panas twice in one day to claim the Section 1 crown. Altogether, Rye won eight postseason games, including three comeback victories and a no-hitter by senior pitcher Peter Davies to eliminate top-seeded Panas.
“It never seemed like the moment was too big for anybody,” Bruno said. “It never seemed like a deficit was too big. They always seemed to play the same way and had the same mindset.”
Pittsford Mendon senior starter Cam Barbulean was untouchable for much of the season, including a nine-inning complete game shutout that sent his team to the state semifinals. He was spotted a 5-0 lead against Rye, but the Garnets again threatened to rally, loading the bases and scoring two runs to chase him from the game in the sixth inning.
It was essentially the only sign of trouble the Vikings encountered during their entire state title run, which ended with a 2-0 win over defending champion Maine-Endwell. Aside from the Rye game, Pittsford Mendon outscored all postseason opponents 36-4.
“Keeping that even-keel the whole year I think helped them tremendously,” Bruno said. “Even when we were down in the state semifinal game, there was no panic. I think we all still thought we were going to win, we just didn’t get the job done.”
Next season, Rye will return a talented core, including junior captains Jackson Pineault and London, but lose seven seniors: Sheridan, Davies, Charlie Rupp, Vinny Sculti, Alex Schatz, Henry Abt, and Will Crawford-Rubin.
Another major adjustment will be a jump up from Class A to Class AA, which means tougher competition to and through the playoffs — but it’s nothing the team hasn’t seen before.
“The talent is definitely going to be improved,” Bruno said. “The teams we play are going to be more challenging. We’ll still be competing with Eastchester, Harrison, Brewster, Lakeland. There are some new teams like Suffern, Mahopac, Fox Lane — who won it this year. We scrimmaged Fox Lane on the way up to Binghamton, so we know we can compete.”
The Foxes, who won Section 1 Class AA and finished as state runners-up, played two June scrimmages against Rye. Fox Lane won the first 4-2, and Rye won the rematch 6-0. The exhibition split, which came in the middle of both teams’ deep postseason runs, provided added confidence for a Rye team that never doubted itself.
“Being able to play an extra month of baseball was amazing, especially for all of us seniors,” Sheridan said. “No one is going to be playing college, so this is kind of the end of all of our careers. Being able to enjoy it all together definitely was special.”
The Class of 2025 is leaving the Rye baseball program in a better place than they found it. It’s hard to make waves in consecutive seasons, but the Garnets show no signs of slowing down, with an aim to continue growing — and winning — next year in Class AA.
“I think it’s a testament to the team that we have no seniors going to play baseball in college,” Bruno said. “Just have a bunch of players who love to play baseball, love playing with their friends, love playing with their boys every single day — and there’s something to say about that. There’s something to say about maybe not having Division I players, but if you have a collection of very, very good players, you can put together a really good season.”
