MICHAEL KIRAL / L’Observateur / March 10, 1999

LUTCHER – An often-quoted baseball cliche is that hitting is contagious.

If that is true, then the St. Charles Catholic Comets caught quite a bug inthe third inning against St. James Saturday afternoon in the Toot GanierMemorial Tournament at Lutcher.

The Comets had the first 19 batters reach base and scored 20 runs in the frame on their way to a 20-2 victory over the Wildcats.

St. Charles Catholic (5-2) went on to win the tournament championship bydefeating Lutcher Sunday, 6-5. John Price hit a 3-run home run and scoredthe winning run in the top of the seventh on an error. Dustin Braud got thewin to improve to 2-0 on the season.

St. James, coming off a 14-5 victory over West St. John Friday in non-district play, fell to 3-6.

Steven Faucheux led off the bottom of the third Saturday by lining a triple to the center field wall. After John Price drew a walk off St Jamesstarter Mitch Cortez (1-1), Faucheux scored on a wild pitch. Wayne Steinfollowed by getting hit by a pitch and Courtney Bonura singled to center to score Price. A single to left by Nick Monica scored Stein to make it 3-0.Cortez walked Matt Weber and was relieved on the mound by Boyd Laurent.

Darrin Gaubert greeted Laurent with a double down the third base line, bringing home Bonura and Monica. After Brandon Laiche walked, Weber andcourtesy runner Jeremy Triche scored as Jarrett Maurin lined a single to left to increase the lead to 7-0.

After Faucheux walked, courtesy runner Mike Mustian scored on a wild pitch. Maurin crossed the plate as Price dropped a single into center andStein followed with another single to score Faucheux.

Dennis Johnson came in to pitch for the Wildcats and gave up a single to third by Bonura to load the bases. Price scored on a wild pitch and Steincame in to score on walks by Monica and Weber. The Comets made it 13-0as Bonura scored on a balk.

Monica and pinch runner Jon Hymel scored as Gaubert singled to short and shortstop Doug Morvant’s throw went past first. Laiche was hit by a pitchand pinch hitter Garrett Stephens singled to left to load the bases. DustinBraud followed with a pinch-hit double into the left-center field gap to bring home Gaubert and Mustian. The Comets finally made an out as MattFisse grounded out to second, scoring Stephens.

St. James got on the scoreboard in the top of the fifth as Eltonary Oubreled off with a walk against reliever Jason LaPorte. Deslatte followed witha single to center. Oubre then scored on a wild pitch as Paul Oubre walked.Laiche then came back in to pitch and got Chris Hymel to hit a grounder to second that scored Deslatte. Laiche then struck out pinch hitter JasonRome and Alvin Bartholomew to end the game.

Laiche started the game for the Comets and settled down after getting out of a first-inning jam. With one out, Bartholomew singled and reachedsecond as Laiche’s throw to second on a grounder by Morvant was in the dirt. With Derek Gros at the plate, Laiche threw a wild pitch allowing bothrunners to move up. Bartholomew tried to score on the play but Gaubertchased down the ball behind the plate and flipped to Laiche for the out.

Laiche then got Gros to fly out to right to end the inning.

Laiche improved to 1-0 with the victory, allowing two hits while striking out four.

“He didn’t have his normal fastball,” St. Charles Catholic coach FrankMonica said of Laiche. “But he was able to get his offspeed stuff over. Hemade them make contact and got outs. There is no defense against walksand he did a good job of that.”St. James coach Davey Clement said he realizes that his team has a waysto go in his second year of running the program.

“We’re young,” Clement said. “It’s the start of a long, hard journey. We arebuilding a program from scratch. Everybody in the River Parishes is builtup except us.”

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