Quagliaroli keeps MCC season alive with Texas masterpiece

TYLER, TX – The MCC baseball team didn’t have much time to recover from a devastating loss hours earlier. But Mike Quagliaroli was able to put it behind him quickly.
The right hander from Windsor Locks threw a complete game with MCC facing elimination in the NJCAA Division III World Series Sunday afternoon as the Cougars beat Niagara CC 8-1 at Mike Carter Field in Tyler TX.
Quagliaroli (4-1) allowed just one unearned run, scattered seven hits and struck out a pair without issuing a walk in a 102 pitch performance. Earlier Sunday morning, MCC was stunned when Montgomery College scored three unearned runs in the bottom of the ninth to take a 7-6 victory into the winners bracket of the tournament.
MCC (28-18-1) will face defending champion Joliet Junior College (40-15) Monday at noon, central time and will be the home team. Joliet lost to Richland College 12-0 in five innings (mercy rule) in Sunday’s third game. MCC next opponent has won two NJCAA Championships (’94 and ’08).
On Saturday night, the Cougars wasted a seven strikeout effort by ace Steve Simon, who left with a 6-4 lead after retiring two batters in the bottom of the seventh.
It was the ninth victory for Quagliaroli as a Cougar and arguably the biggest of his two-year career in Manchester – perhaps the biggest of his life. “I kept the pitch count low and hit the spots,” Quagliaroli said. “It took me two or three innings to get it going, but yeah, it was my biggest win.”
Quagliaroli hit for himself and helped his cause with a seventh inning double and scored MCC’s sixth run.
“I was able to hit the inside and outside on command,” Quagliaroli said. “We had a couple of guys saw it off on the handles and that’s what did it.”
Peter Burgio (Bolton) drove in three runs while Herb Coggeshall (Coventry) and Alan Fredriksson (Torrington) scored three runs apiece for the Cougars. A. J. Lowers (Newington) and Nick Melino (Cromwell) each had two hits and an RBI.
“I wanted to make it a step up from last year,” Quagliaroli said of MCC’s disappointment in Tyler a year ago when it lost both games in the tournament. “Even though I want the whole thing, one game is a start.”
Quagliaroli, who is with the Air National Guard in Windsor Locks, has made four trips to Texas in the past two years – two with his unit two more the MCC baseball team. The work ethic and discipline from his military training has carried over to the baseball diamond.
“Between the last few games, you get the jitters out and understand that it’s just a game,” Quagliaroli said. “You just go out and do what you know how to do. The military training helps. It always does.”
MCC had not won a game on the national level in any sport since May 21st 1994 when Mike Susi’s baseball team beat Penn State – Beaver 10-0 in the D3 Series in Jamestown, NY before losing to eventual champion Joliet Jr. College and Gloucester CC.
“He came to play,” MCC Head Coach Chris Strahowski said of Quagliaroli at the hotel after the national drought ended. “They (Niagra) had no shot today. He was ahead of guys, throwing strikes, using the defense, keeping everybody involved. That’s the way games are supposed to be played.”
Strahowski was not surprised the 21-year old sophomore, a former two-time state champion at Windsor Locks High, was able to deliver with the season on the line.
“He’s a little bit older of a guy and knows what it takes to win and he wasn’t about to let what happened last night affect what he wanted to do today,” Strahowski said.
Niagra (34-8) used four pitchers and got three hits out of Jordon Windisch (all singles) in the season-ending loss.