By RYAN ARENA

L’Observateur

NEW ORLEANS — After a disappointing end to its prep season, St. Charles Catholic easily could have let it fester into its summer, allowing its American Legion Townsend Homes team to slink into irrelevancy against a tough schedule by midseason.

Instead, a hungry Townsend Homes squad has put together its best Legion campaign in years.

While the Comets fell short of the state baseball tournament for the first time in five years, Townsend Homes reaches its summer goal of the Southeast Regional for the first time in that span, beginning with today’ s game against Shaw-based Refuel at Kirsch-Rooney Stadium.

First pitch will occur 35 minutes after the conclusion of the tournament’s first game, which begins at 9 a.m. The tournament is scheduled to run through Wednesday.

The field also includes teams based from Destrehan, Rummel, Brother Martin and Jesuit, among others. The format is double-elimination, and the winner advances to the state Legion tournament in Minden from July 23-27.

“It’s exciting. We’ve accomplished what we wanted to this summer,” said Townsend Homes coach Paul Waguespack. “But now, we’re a little greedy. We want to keep going.

“The tough thing is, this is a Shaw team that beat us pretty good at the tournament at Segnette during prep season. We know all about them. They’re good, and we need to come out ready to play.”

The regional tournament games will extend to nine innings.

Townsend Homes got over a major hump during the Second District tournament, defeating Valero-St. Charles (Destrehan) and Otto Candies (Hahnville). Those two teams had combined to defeat Townsend Homes six times in the double-elimination playoffs over the last three summers.

The wins clinched the Second District’s top seed for Townsend. The tournament was abbreviated due to rainouts last week, and ended after its win over Valero.

The come-from-behind win over Valero was especially impressive to Waguespack.

“No team that I’ve coached could have done what that team did, coming back from being down 2-0 in the sixth inning and scoring five runs to beat Destrehan. All the credit goes to these kids,” Waguespack says. “These guys make me enjoy coming to the ballpark. (Assistant coach) Wayne (Stein) and I agree, it doesn’t feel like a grind to us now, and it’s because of these kids and their attitude.”

Their stellar play has matched the positive attitude. Donnie Savoie leads the team in hitting with a .371 average, while Shane McNeil (.365), Macky Cortez (.354) and Austin Ourso (.348) all carry high averages. Savoie, Cortez and Ourso are new starters, while returning seniors McNeil and Brady Hitt (team-leading 15 RBIs) have maintained momentum from productive prep years.

But the pitching has been a true eye-opener. Opponents are batting only .158 off of a Townsend Homes pitching staff headed by starters Jared Keating (3-1) and Cody McMurry (4-3).

Townsend pitching has held Valero to eight hits in two games, while it’s held Retif Oil (Jesuit) to six over two games this summer.

“It’s been a long time since I can say we’ve had a staff keep teams under .200,” said Waguespack. “And we’ve had some real good staffs here. That’s big time, and we’ve done it against good programs.”

In a way, Waguespack says, the team’s early exit from the playoffs has fueled the fire behind his team’s summer run.

“Guys have something to prove,” said Waguespack. “They’re hungry, they’re ready to work. I like our chances. I think we’re as good as anyone else there, and the results over the past few weeks have bared that out.

“But I know this — no matter what, if we win or we go two losses and out, it’s been a successful summer. We got to where we needed to get to.”