The Warwick North 10/11-year-old all-stars played home run derby at Wickford’s Wilson Park on Sunday night.

North crushed four balls out of the park to cruise past Cumberland American, 11-3, and earn a berth in the state championship game. Vito Vinciguerra and Colby Barker each put in three innings of work on the mound, holding Cumberland to just two hits in the last four frames.

“We have a lot of hitters,” North manager Steve Cote said. “Every kid on our team can hit. We have a lot of power. We have six or seven guys that can hit home runs. Fortunately for us, it happened tonight. The kids came out swinging the bats tonight and can’t ask for anything more than that.”

Vinciguerra toed the rubber to start the game, and he ran into trouble after a quiet first inning. North led 2-0, but Cumberland cut that deficit in half quickly when James Sukatos ripped an RBI single up the middle to score Andre Mastin on just the fourth pitch of the second. 

Andy Ray’s bases-loaded bloop single tied the game at 2 before Vinciguerra was able to strike out Charlie Tarara for the first out. Vinciguerra would allow another run to cross after he walked J.J. Sanzi with the bases full, but he worked out of the jam without further damage. 

He would pitch a scoreless third as well, paving the way for North’s rally in the bottom half. 

“He got a little rattled in the second inning, but he hung in there, got through the inning, [and then] got through three innings,” Cote said of Vinciguerra.

Tarara worked a quick out to begin the inning, but he couldn’t get Thomas D’Andrea to go quietly all night. He worked an eight-pitch walk in the first, and had his third-inning count up to seven when he launched a home run over the right field fence. 

Tarara would yield to Sanzi after walking Jack Hornstein on a full count, but Sanzi would have his own struggles. He walked Barker, and a wild pitch put two runners in scoring position. Bobby Vale stepped in, looking for redemption after a double play with the bases loaded and no outs in the first.

He would deliver the decisive blow. Vale cracked a 3-1 pitch to deep left center field that was gone when it left the bat, shifting momentum to Warwick North and giving it a 6-3 lead.

“It definitely felt better than running into a double play first time up,” Vale said.

Barker worked fast and efficiently in relief for North, throwing only 31 pitches in three innings. Figuiera represented Cumberland’s biggest threat in the late innings when he came to the plate with two players in scoring position in the fourth. Barker would get a foul-tip strikeout into the mitt to preserve the slim advantage. 

As Cumberland searched for an offensive groove, North locked into one. It would put the game away with a five-run fifth inning, and everyone crossed the dish by way of the long ball. Hornstein wasted no time adding insurance, sending the first pitch of the frame to center field and out of the park. 

Two walks and a single loaded the bases for Vinciguerra, who tagged a 1-0 pitch over the wall in right center. His grand slam sealed the win and a berth in the state championship on Wednesday at Wilson Park. 

“When I hit that, I thought it was gonna hit the fence,” Vinciguerra said of his line-drive homer.

North will face the winner of Barrington/Cumberland, which will take place tonight at 6:30 p.m.

The confidence level is high for North, according to Cote, after scoring 17 runs in the past two games and remaining unbeaten since the first game of the district tournament. 

“We’ve battled, they’re a tough bunch of kids,” Cote said. “We battled from the get-go. We had three games where we were down two runs, two runs [and] four runs in the bottom of the sixth that we can back and won those games to win the district. They’re a tough bunch of kids, they’re never out of it. They believe in themselves, and hopefully we can do it for one more game.”