Tournament Time Arrives For Nutley Spring Sports including Volleyball, Softball, Baseball

NUTLEY, NJ - With the month of May fast approaching, that also means that the high school baseball and softball tournaments will be getting underway. Nutley received single digit seeds in their respective tournaments this past week. Here's a look: Baseball Nutley (2-10) may have only tasted victory twice this season, but it plays in one of the most competitive divisions in the state - the American Division of the Super Essex Conference. That pedigree earned the Raiders the eighth seed for the 91st Greater Newark Tournament and a first round home game against ninth-seeded Barringer on Friday, May 3. If Nutley prevails it would play at top-seeded Livingston in a GNT quarterfinal on May 8. Eight of Nutley's 10 losses this season are to teams seeded ahead of it, including fourth-seeded Montclair twice. Nutley blanked Memorial, 9-0, on Saturday night at part of the Alzheimer's Awareness Invitational at the Essex/Hudson Challenge in West New York. Drew Slomkowski was 3-for-4 with a triple, a home run, four RBI and three runs, Santino Ruiz went 2-for-3 with a double and three RBI and Eugenio Roman was 2-for-4 with an RBI and a run to pace the 11-hit offense. Chris Suriani (five hits, 11 strikeouts, no walks in six innings) and Slomkowski (no hits, two strikeouts, one walk in one inning) combined on a five-hitter. Softball The Lady Raiders were seeded seventh for the ECT and will play at seventh-seeded West Essex in a first round game on Saturday, May 4. A win there and Nutley would likely play second-seeded Livingston in the quarterfinal round on May 11. The county semifinals are slated for Friday, May 17 with the championship game scheduled for the following day at 7 p.m. Nutley currently owns a 9-5 record this spring with its most recent victory coming on Monday, April 22 when it won at Bloomfield, 4-3. That game saw Makenna DeJianne pitch a four-hitter with eight strikeouts and five walks. She also doubled in two runs during a three-run fourth inning as Nutley took a 4-0 lead. Skye Stoeckel doubled and scored, Gabriella Mariano doubled in a run and Kaitlyn Nellegar singled in a run to round out the offense. Nutley, under the direction of head coach Luann Zullo, is also in second place in the Liberty Division of the Super Essex Conference with an 8-2 mark. Boys Volleyball Nutley, seeded 14th, defeated 19th-seeded Arts, 25-18, 25-23, in the preliminary round of the Essex County Tournament on April 24 before bowing to third-seeded West Caldwell Tech, 25-9, 25-11, in the first round. Against Arts, the Raiders (8-5) were led by Evan Petrov (18 assists, five digs, three kills, three service points, two aces), Gavin Warburton (eight kills, seven digs, six service points, four aces), Shane Castellanos (six kills, five digs, four service points, two aces, two blocks), Ilhan Ilhan (three digs, three service points, three aces), Kaan Aydin (four digs, one service point), Saman Hashemi (three kills, five service points, two aces, one dig) and Lucas Samaloff (four digs).

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