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Dark Horses: Brick Memorial Pitching Tandem Leads SCT Upset Win Over CBA

Matt Manley|May 20, 2025|Last Updated May 20, 2025

MIDDLETOWN — The top-seed in the Shore Conference Tournament was all that stood between the Brick Memorial baseball team and its first trip to the tournament final in 35 years and Mustangs coach Evan Rizzitello had a team of players who had already proven they could go toe-to-toe with No. 1 Christian Brothers Academy.

Zach Pirnik, however, was not one of those players. The sophomore left-hander took the mound on March 29 with his team leading CBA by a run and gave the ball back to his coach two innings later with his team trailing by three after surrendering four runs in his two innings of relief.

With a trip to the SCT final on the line and multiple appealing options available to him as Monday’s starting pitcher, Rizzitello gave the unflappable sophomore southpaw another shot at the No. 1 team in the Shore Sports Insider Top 10 and Pirnik showed why his coaches and teammates trust him in the most pressure-packed situations.

After surrendering a run in the bottom of the first, Pirnik navigated through five consecutive scoreless innings thereafter before turning it over to senior Brayden Nalducci, who put the finishing touches on Brick Memorial’s 2-1 upset over CBA Monday to send the fourth-seeded Mustangs to the SCT final for the first time since 1990.

Pirnik worked around at least one baserunner in every inning but pitched his way out of trouble in every instance except the bottom of the first, when he limited the damage to just one run on an RBI double by CBA senior catcher and RBI leader Dan Tsimbinos. The sophomore scattered six hits and four walks while striking out four and stranding 10 CBA baserunners — including seven in scoring position. CBA went 2-for-13 with three strikeouts and one RBI with runners in scoring position against Pirnik on Monday.

“We felt like (Pirnik) was an excellent choice to start today because of his temperament,” Rizzitello said. “He’s pretty even-keeled. He doesn’t get too high when he’s successful. He doesn’t get too down if he’s struggling or if teams get up on him. You saw that today when they went up 1-0, so we were really confident and the added bonus was how well he pitched with runners on base.”

“In a close game like this, every run counts, every pitch counts, every play counts,” Pirnik said. “It’s hard, but it’s part of the job.”

The story was much different for Pirnik in Brick Memorial’s March 29 season-opener vs. CBA, in which the Colts tagged the sophomore for four runs on six hits in two innings of work in CBA’s 9-4 win at Brick Memorial. Nalducci had allowed one run over the first four innings and gave the ball to Pirnik with a 2-1 lead, with the Mustangs scoring two runs off junior left-hander and University of Virginia commit Sean Loggie.

“I came into the season riding high and got hit around a little bit,” Pirnik said. “But I was ready for the rematch. Revenge is sweet. It felt great to get the ball and get it done and overcome what happened earlier in the season.

“I was really stoked for the season and the first game was a chance to play the number one team in the Shore. We’re super pumped for it and it hurt. It definitely hurt a lot. I thought we were going to win, so I was upset after that. But revenge is sweet. That’s all I can say.”

On Monday, Pirnik was determined to get the ball to Nalducci with the lead while facing another one of CBA’s talented junior left-handers, Danny DiTullio. The Colts and DiTullio gained the early edge, with DiTullio setting down the top of Brick Memorial’s lineup on 11 pitches in the top of the first, followed by an early strike by the CBA lineup.

Senior centerfielder Will Fahey ripped a leadoff single in the left-centerfield and pushed up to second base on a sacrifice bunt by senior Justin Fuerbacher. Tsimbinos then stepped in and roped a double that one-hopped the leftfield fence and scored Fahey from first for a 1-0 CBA lead. The double was the 12th and the RBI the 29th of the season for Tsimbinos, whose batting average dropped to .517 after he finished Monday 1-for-2 with a pair of walks.

Brick Memorial’s offense, however, did not leave Pirnik hanging. In the top of the second, the Mustangs gave their starter all the help he would need to pitch his team to the championship game.

“Our guys have been coming through all season,” Pirnik said. “We are always prepared. To get those two runs, it definitely felt like we were here and we brought energy and I was confident throughout the whole game.”

Nalducci worked a seven-pitch walk to lead off the second – one of just two walks allowed by DiTullio in his six innings of work. Senior centerfielder Jimi Popp then dropped down a bunt and beat it out to first base to give the Mustangs men on first and second with none out.

Junior Brody Moore then followed with another bunt, with his serving as a sacrifice that moved both runners up into scoring position. Sophomore Mike Figner then followed with a hot shot to third base that CBA senior Dan Russo stopped with a back-hand stab. Russo, however, could not keep Figner’s hard-hit ball in his glove and the ricochet allowed Nalducci to score and gave Popp just enough time to dive into third base ahead of a diving tag attempt by Russo.

Figner pulled in at first base with an RBI infield single for his second RBI hit in as many games during the SCT. In Saturday’s 5-0 win over Colts Neck, Figner broke a scoreless tie with an RBI double in the bottom of the fourth inning and on Monday’s game, he made a sliding catch in rightfield for the first out of the sixth inning – three keystone moments from the sophomore after he missed two weeks due to an ankle injury.

“Figner’s close to 100 percent, if not 100 percent,” Rizzitello said. “He is in the lineup for his bat. He is not the most fleet of foot, but I think he wasn’t letting that ball drop today.”

With runners on the corners and one out in the top of the second, senior Luke Douglas gave Brick Memorial the lead with a ground ball to the left side of the infield that plated Popp from third base as Russo fielded the ball and fired to first base for the out. DiTullio held the Mustangs there at two runs and would watch as his offense threaten to tie the game in each of the next five innings without breaking through – all while DiTullio allowed just two hits and one walk over his final four innings and did not allow a runner past first base.

CBA stranded a runner at second base in the bottom of the second after A.J. Fiore reached on an infield single with one out and took second on a sacrifice bunt. In the third, the Colts set up shop with runners on first and second and none out thanks to and error and a walk, then made it second and third with one out when Russo bunted the runners over.

Sophomore Ryan Wetmore scalded a line drive right to second baseman Dan Popovitch for a hard-hit, hard-luck second out that did not advance the runners. Pirnik then induced an inning-ending ground out to shortstop Tyler Garbooshian.

Fiore sparked another CBA threat in the bottom of the fourth with a one-out double to the left-center gap, to which Pirnik responded with a strikeout for the second out. Fahey stepped in and ripped a hard ground ball toward shortstop that Garbooshian fielded despite being screened by Fiore at second base. Garbooshian’s throw to first was not in time to get Fahey, but his effort keeping the ball on the infield prevented Fiore from scoring and allowed Pirnik to get out of the inning with a strikeout one batter later.

“He’s only a sophomore, which is crazy,” Nalducci said. “He’s the most mature pitcher we have. He has great stuff, he is always confident in himself, he is a great teammate, so it was awesome to see him go out there and just chuck a great game for six innings and to be able to close it for him. It was pretty cool to watch him keep pitching himself out of jams.”

In the fifth, Pirnik walked Tsimbinos to lead off and Wetmore with one out before getting out of the inning with a fielder’s choice ground ball that Garbooshian flipped to third base for the force out, followed by an inning-ending fly-out to Popp in centerfield.

Fahey picked up his third hit of the game with two out in the sixth and stole second base, but Pirnik finished his outing by inducing a ground out to Garbooshian at shortstop. Garbooshian capped a stellar defensive inning for the Mustangs, with Figner making his sliding catch in shallow rightfield for the first out and first baseman Dan Golembiewski stopping an unpredictable hop with his chest for the second out.

“Dan works the hardest out of any of our guys, whether it’s on defense or in the cage,” Rizzitello said of Golembiewski. “Getting in front of that ball and chesting it up in that situation shows a lot. I think a lot of kids were impressed with that.”

“I can’t be who I am without them in the field,” Pirnik said. “They play really good defense and I just have to trust them, no matter what. With every pitch I throw, I have confidence that every fielder is going to make a play.”

Pirnik’s savvy pitching was made possible by his ability to pitch backwards thanks to a curveball that he successfully threw as a chase pitch and for a strike. All four of his strikeouts came on his curveball and of the 23 pitches he threw in a critical fifth inning against hitters three through seven in the CBA order, 15 of them were curveballs.

“I felt like I had control of all my stuff,” Pirnik said. “(Pitching) Coach (Chris) James calls a great game. He calls those offspeeds and curveballs and I’ve just got to trust myself and have confidence in every pitch. Every time there is a pitch put down, I’m confident it’s the right one. He sees the game really well, so I trust whatever he wants to throw.”

Brick Memorial’s breaking-ball heavy diet for the CBA hitters continued in the bottom of the seventh, when Rizzitello turned the game over Nalducci after Pirnik had thrown 105 pitches through six – five short of the single-game limit, per NJSIAA pitch-count rules. Nalducci featured a heavy dose of his curveball-slider combination on March 29, when he held CBA to one run on two hits over four innings while striking out six.

“After that first game on opening day, I gained a lot of confidence in myself that day, especially against this team,” Nalducci said. “I faced the order two or three times, so I definitely knew how to face them. Then, after seeing Pirnik shove all game against them and throw a great game, I knew that I pretty much just had to do my thing and we’d be set.”

“Brayden wanted the start today and he was slightly disappointed that he wasn’t the starter, but he bought into what we wanted to do,” Rizzitello said. “Once he saw Zach putting up zeroes after the first inning, he was getting more and more excited. He kept asking me to go in the game, but we wanted to stick with Zach for as long as we could. He holds runners well and we were at the bottom of the their lineup in the sixth inning, but once we hit the seventh inning, it was a no-brainer we were going right to Nalducci.”

Nalducci was tasked Monday with facing the Nos. 3, 4 and 5 hitters in the CBA order, starting with Tsimbinos. Nalducci threw Tsimbinos four breaking balls and Tsimbinos hit the fourth into rightfield, where Figner grabbed it for the first out. The breaking balls kept coming to Russo, who saw three from Nalducci and hit a soft line-out to Popovitch at second base.

“My curveball and my slider are my slider are like my main pitches,” Nalducci said. “I thrown them for strikes more than my fastball. Soon enough, they’ll start sitting on my curveball and I’ll blow a fastball by him.

“I wasn’t really thinking about what to throw. When I start, I normally pick and choose what I throw a little bit more but I just trusted (James) for whatever he was calling and I wasn’t thinking about anything but the batter I was facing and the pitch I was throwing.”

After getting ahead of Ryan Wetmore, 1-2, with his curve-slider mix, Nalducci reached back for his first fastball and nearly ended the game with a strikeout. Wetmore swung at a pitch that reached the backstop and ran to first as though he missed it, but the home plate umpire ruled the ball was tipped, which took Wetmore off first base and put him back in the batter’s box with a 1-2 count still on him.

Nalducci’s 1-2 offering missed, but on 2-2, he broke off one last curveball that dropped into the zone for strike three, setting off Brick Memorial’s celebration.

“I think the experience of pitching against them helped (Pirnik) today,” Rizzitello said. “I think it helped the whole team — seeing them up close and playing with them for six innings. Obviously, we didn’t finish the job on opening day, but if we don’t play them opening day, I can’t say we would have had the same confidence today.”

Not only will Brick Memorial be aiming to win its first ever Shore Conference Tournament title on Wednesday at ShoreTown Ballpark in Lakewood; the Mustangs will be looking to break the stranglehold that five teams have held over the tournament over the past 16 seasons.

Since 2008, five teams – Red Bank Catholic (five), CBA (four), Toms River North (three), Jackson Memorial (two) and Toms River South (two) – have won multiple SCT championships, while no other team has won one. Since 2013, only RBC, CBA and Toms River North have won titles and RBC and the last public school to win the tournament was Toms River North in 2018.

“The Shore Conference Tournament is an extremely difficult tournament to navigate,” Rizzitello said. “Being in the final is still something that hasn’t sunk in. We’ve only been there one time and one time only and it’s ironic because we honored the 1990 team earlier this year for their Ocean County Tournament championship. So, we’re pretty excited and we’re really looking forward to it.”

While Brick Memorial will play in its first SCT final since 1990 on Wednesday, Red Bank Catholic will be opposing the Mustangs while playing in its sixth SCT championship game in the last seven seasons. The Mustangs have already won their first division championship since 1996 by winning Class A South and played in the Ocean County Tournament final, which they lost, 3-1, to Toms River East.

“It would be really special to go out there and win the first one,” Nalducci said. “If there is a team that can do it, it’s this team.”

 

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