VIDEO: Heacock’s pitching, timely situational hitting help LCM snap loss streak

Posted: May 2nd 2025

By BRIAN CUNNIFF

CapeAtlanticLive.com

ERMA – A local high school baseball team in desperate need of a victory got one Thursday afternoon.

Previously losers of eight straight games, Lower Cape May used timely situational hitting and a complete-game pitching performance from Aydan Heacock to post a 3-2 win over Atlantic County Institute of Technology.

The win was Lower’s first since April 10.

“We needed this very, very desperately,” Lower coach Ryan Slaney said. “It’s been a very long, struggling bus ride for us that we couldn’t find a way off for a while, so this was a nice one to get.”

Cooper Milligan’s RBI groundout to third base in the sixth inning scored Drew Kronemeyer with the winning run in the sixth inning.

Lower got the tying run one inning earlier in similar fashion when Ty Heacock scored on Sean Kelleher’s groundout to second base.

“We were struggling with runners in scoring position today, with some not-great approaches at the plate, swinging at bad pitches and letting some good ones go by,” Slaney said. “But then our young guys came through. A freshman, Ty Heacock, got a great read off the bat to score, and then another freshman, Cooper Milligan, hits a hard ground ball to the left side of the infield to get another run in. It was good to see us put pressure on the defense.

“Our bats haven’t been great lately, so it was nice to see us manufacture a couple runs with some small ball.”

Lower trailed 2-0 after the first inning when ACIT plated a pair of unearned runs after an error. Matt DiCave’s line-drive single to right center that scored Milligan with two outs in the third gave the Tigers their first run.

DiCave leads Lower in hitting at .396 and also has a team-high 12 RBI.

“Ironically, Matt’s been in a slump the last couple weeks,” Slaney said. “He got off to a great start to the season but he had been struggling lately, so to see him sting a ball, as he’s known to do, especially to the opposite field, that’s huge.”

Aydan Heacock held ACIT scoreless after the first inning. The senior scattered seven hits and struck out eight against only two walks.

“Aydan’s been a big guy for us on the mound and he got better as the game went on,” Slaney said. “Most kids, after that kind of first inning, they might let that bother them and they get rattled but he didn’t. He got better as the game went on. He was actually better in the seventh inning than he was early in the game. I’m super proud of him.”

The win improved Lower to 4-12. With six starters back and talented freshmen such as Milligan, Ty Heacock and Ashton Ray added to the lineup, Lower had expected to be a bit better at this point. But the Tigers are hoping to follow a similar path as last season, when they won just six of their first 16 games before reeling off wins in 10 of 11 contests prior to a defeat in the South Jersey Group II semifinal game.

Lower endured some hard luck during its eight-game losing streak. One of the defeats was a 3-2 decision to Middle Township in a game in which DiCave and Ty Heacock combined for 20 strikeouts on the mound. Another came in an 11-9 loss to Oakcrest in a wild finish that saw the Falcons rally for six runs after trailing 9-5 in the top of the seventh inning after having two outs and no runners on base.

Perhaps Thursday’s win over ACIT turns the team’s fortunes.

“If we can get our bats going, I think we can be a difficult team to beat,” Slaney said. “We have a deep pitching staff and we have a lot of upperclassmen. If Matt and Drew and some of the other guys can get going at the plate, it’s going to be a fun end of the season for us.”

Lower is back in action Friday evening when it hosts Ocean City for a 7 o’clock contest.