By Andy Hutchison

FAIRFIELD — Staples baseball capped a busy stretch of five games over eight days highlighted by Saturday’s 10-0 victory over host Fairfield Ludlowe at Kiwanis Field.

The five-inning mercy rule outcome left the Wreckers 9-3 in FCIAC play and holding the No. 3 seed, with potential for movement in the coming conference playoffs.

Staples still has work to do with three games this week through Wednesday, followed by an off day (weather permitting), and then the FCIAC playoffs start Friday.

“This is exactly what we needed with a lot of rainouts and a busy schedule coming up,” Coach Jack McFarland said Saturday, whose taxed pitching rotation was spared a couple innings’ work due to the lopsided outcome against Ludlowe. 

The Wreckers jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the first inning and tacked on. “We came out to play today,” McFarland said.

Lefthander Kai Nee, the starting pitcher, went four innings, allowing two hits and striking out seven. Mason Tobias, in his first mound work of the year following an injury, went one solid, hitless frame and fanned two.

The Wreckers used strong hitting, base running — including eight stolen bases — and top-notch pitching (“Kai was electric today,” McFarland said) in cruising to victory.

“We put it all together today,” the Staples coach said.

Mark Kelly had two hits and three runs batted in against Ludlowe; compiling a mind-boggling 10-for-16 slate with six runs batted during the past week to lead the offense.

Connor Brill had two hits, three RBI and two runs scored in the Ludlowe game. Bruce Schlegelmilch logged two hits, two RBI and a run scored.

Cole Landgraf had three stolen bases and Andrew Oppenheimer swiped two bags.

During the last five games Oppenheimer and Jules Cicero both recorded seven hits and Cooper Brundige collected five base knocks. Bruce, Brill and Landgraf each had four hits. Brill had five runs batted in, Schlegelmilch drove in four and Jake Goldshore added three RBI.

The pitching has been outstanding in recent games as well with Nee, Ben Cukier and Oppenheimer combining on 18 innings where they allowed only four earned runs during the last four games. The pitchers combined for 23 strikeouts in 28 innings, giving the Wreckers a chance to win every day.

On Monday, Staples visits Westhill of Stamford at 4 p.m. (Game schedules are subject to change; click for the latest CIAC updates.)  

Andy Hutchison has been covering school sports — including Staples athletics — as well as news and feature stories in Fairfield County, since the 1990s.