Fairfield, CT — Fairfield Warde coach Brett Conner told his team that if they were going to win on Wednesday, they would have to play tougher than Shelton. If anyone would know, it’s Conner, who played for the late Ed Marocco at Shelton high. “When you get in-between the white lines, you have to buckle your chinstrap and play hard baseball and that’s what Shelton brings,” Conner said. “They’re going to play tough; they’re going to be gritty, we had to be grittier today.” With runners on second and third and no outs in the bottom of the eighth, Conner gave a sign to Griffin Polley. Bunt. Polley got the squeeze down as Roman DiGiacomo sprinted home to score the game-winning run in Fairfield Warde’s 3-2 win over Shelton in the Class LL second round at Fairfield Warde on Wednesday afternoon. “Nowadays you tell a guy to bunt, and they roll their eyes at you,” Conner said with a laugh. “But I kept telling them you will win a game if you trust it and you execute it, you will win a ball game that matters. “They were ready for it.” Polley said he got nervous when he saw the sign from his coach but credited all the practice they have done to prepare for the moment. “I was running to first and immediately looked at my first base coach’s reaction,” Polley, a sophomore, said. “I saw him stick his hands up and I knew that was it.” The win sends Fairfield Warde to the Class LL quarterfinals where the Mustangs will face Greenwich on Saturday, for the third time this season and second time in eight days. Conner not only played for Shelton, but he played for Shelton coach Scott Gura. “That’s Shelton baseball, like I remember for years,” said Gura, who has coached in the Shelton program for 23 years. “That’s how we always played baseball.” The longtime Shelton coach, coached Conner when he was in middle school and was an assistant coach on the varsity team under Marocco. “Shelton athletics taught me a lot of great life lessons,” Conner said. “I am a proud Shelton alum. I was proud to see that they are tough.” The Gaels jumped out to an early one run lead on a Connor Jensen home run in the second inning. Warde got two back in the bottom of the inning on a sacrifice fly and RBI single by Jack Andrews. An RBI triple by Jensen tied the game in the fourth. The score remained the same the rest of the way until the eighth. A big reason was the pitching. Shelton’s Anthony Steele went 5 2/3 innings, striking out 11 batters and he allowed just five hits. On the other side, Polley went 4 1/3 before Conner went to Zach Broderick. Broderick pitched Warde to the FCIAC championship on Friday against Greenwich and was set to probably start on Saturday in the quarterfinals if Fairfield Warde advanced. The junior lefty came in with two runners on and had to face Steele and Jensen in the fifth inning. He struck both out to end the threat. “I had to come with a great mindset against (Steele) and same with their four hitter,” Broderick said. “That gave a lot of energy to our whole team.” He struck out the next five batters and finished with nine strikeouts in 32/3 innings. “He is a bulldog. He loves the name on the chest, he plays with a lot of pride for the school, and he’s been like that since he was in little league,” Conner said. Broderick pitched around one base runner in the eighth to set up his team to walk off. “We just didn’t have an answer for (Broderick), we struck out 14 times (all game),” Gura said. “We had plenty of opportunities to take the lead.” Player of the Game Zach Broderick, Fairfield Warde: The junior came out of the bullpen and dominated. He allowed no hits in 3 2/3 innings and struck out nine batters. Quotable “I said that’s great, we have a Shelton guy that is going to move on to the quarterfinals, whether it was me or him. I am proud of my guys but I also proud of him, knowing what a great coach he is.” — Shelton coach Scott Gura said when he found out his team was going to play against Fairfield Warde on Wednesday. WARDE 3, SHELTON 2 WARDE 020 000 01 — 3 8 0 SHELTON 010 100 00 — 2 3 0 Batteries: W — Griffin Polley, Zach Broderick (W, 5) and Roman DiGiacomo. Shelton — Anthony Steele, Ben Van Tine (L, 6) and Nick Piscioniere 2B: W — Roman DiGiacomo 3B: S — Connor Jensen HR: S — Connor Jensen Records: Fairfield Warde 19-3, Shelton 11-9 Credit: https://www.gametimect.com/griffin-polleys-squeeze-sends-warde-past-shelton/