Groton — It turns out fate had something redemptive in mind after all, even if its delivery was quirky. Go figure that a few days after the baseball players of Fitch High needed barf bags to stand there and watch somebody else celebrate the conference tournament title on their lawn, the Falcons got the chance Tuesday to do the celebratory-pile-of-humanity thing, too.

Quite a day. Eleven innings. More twists than a ballpark pretzel. But when it ended on the field that really ought to be named after Ed Harvey, the former three-time state championship coach, the fighting Jeff Joyces of Fitch outlasted Bethel, 4-3, living to see today and the second round of the Class L tournament.

First the game. Put it this way: Joyce was so exasperated at one point that he turned to some kids watching along the fence near his dugout and said, "Want some life wisdom? Don't coach baseball."

The Falcons, down 2-1 in the seventh, rallied to tie the game with two walks, a hit batter and a wild pitch. It recalled the great Vin Scully line about being beaten to death by angry mosquitoes.

Then they were down 3-2 in the 11th — this after freshman catcher Tyler Nelli helped turn a nifty 5-2-3 double play to escape the top of the inning — when Fitch summoned the spirit of St. Louis.

That would be Colton St. Louis, who stepped to the plate with two on and one out. With two strikes, he saw a breaking ball down and away. He swung. His rear end went left. His bat went right. The result: game-tying dunk shot single to right.

"I'm going to be completely honest. I had two strikes on me and it was a curveball away. I tried to foul it off down the line and it dropped in," St. Louis, also the winning pitcher, said. "Really, I was trying to push it into the woods and I put it down the line somehow."

Joyce: "Colton's swing looked like he was trying to sweep a mess up in the corner of his house. He managed to muscle it out into right field. Not a laser beam. But that's what we'd been frustrated with all day. With two strikes, not being competitive during the at bat. And Colton comes through with a street sweeper."

Ryan Tuohy's bases-loaded walk won it for the Falcs, who got to pile on each other ... just as NFA did on the Fitch field last week. Oy. Imagine: With the ECC semifinals playing on, the Fitch kids, eliminated earlier in the tournament, had to practice elsewhere. They even got asked to pull the tarp off the mound. Oh, the indignity.

"It was awful. A lot of us came out to see the games. As soon as we got here, we got bitter," shortstop Jake Parizo said. "It was like 'guys, why did we even bother to show up if we're going to be this grumpy?' It was — Jesus, man — it was awful. Not even get a chance to defend our own turf. We watch NFA, who we beat the week before, come here and win on our field. All-around bitter for everyone.

"I think that's why we played so hard today. The biggest problem we've had as a team is being pretty soft. Lack of mental toughness. But we had it today. We stuck it out for 11 innings. We played so hard because we didn't want to watch someone else celebrate on our home field."

Joyce: "It was being evicted from out home. Nothing against NFA. I have such great admiration for (NFA coach) Luke (Gabordi). A great friend and colleague. (Joyce is a teacher at NFA). I'm happy for him. But here we are trying to get ourselves prepared for state tournament, getting kicked out of our rooms. That really frosted me. I'm usually pretty good as I get older about flushing losses and moving on. This one got buried in my craw. The whole experience for me was Prozac Nation."

But then came fate. Happy, Tuesday fate. And the good news that an upset at the other end of the state has the Falcs home again today.

"I will say this," Joyce said. "It pleases me to come back to probably one of my favorite places in earth, this baseball field. We got a beautiful day, a big crowd and come to find out we have another opportunity to play a game here at my favorite place."

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro.