Right-hander Nick DeRosa, who allowed one runner as far as second base all night, took care of the classic pitching portion of the game with a complete-game three-hitter, striking out four and walking none. One of the three hits was an infield roller in the second inning.

"Nick DeRosa did a great job," said Ashland manager Dan Sullivan, who saw his team improve to 4-2. "He kept them off balance all night long. He needed just 81 pitches (for the complete game). I can't remember a base runner from the third inning on."

Give Sullivan credit for excellent recall and DeRosa credit for having excellent stuff.

Leadoff batter Matt O'Donnell, who was 2-for-3, singled to right field with two outs in the third for the final Somerville base runner of the game. DeRosa retired the last 13 batters of the night, including Robert Taylor looking for the game's final out.

"I had confidence in all my pitches," said DeRosa. "I felt like I threw well and I didn't walk anyone. I felt good warming up, I felt good and strong."

As the catcher, Chris Papadellis had the best view of DeRosa's work of art on the mound, and of course liked what he saw.

"Nick was great," said Papadellis. "He spotted his pitches well. He threw all of his pitches for strikes. Nick's pretty consistent and when he's throwing all his pitches for strikes he's going to be tough to beat."

DeRosa, who also didn't walk a batter in his first outing of the season, had to be tough because - truth be told - Ashland wasn't exactly ripping the cover off the ball on this particular night. Post 77 was only able to generate six hits off hard-luck loser Eric O'Brien, who struck out two and walked no one.

In fact, Ashland scored the game's lone run in the first inning, the only frame in which the locals had more than one hit. Pat Curtis singled to right field with two outs, took second on a passed ball and scored on Cato LaCroix's line single into the left field gap.

"I just went up there looking for something to hit," said LaCroix. "I let a couple of off-speed pitches go by and then jumped on a fastball."

"We've been doing a lot with two out," said Sullivan of LaCroix's key hit. "We'll take it. No, I didn't think that would be it at the time. Pat Curtis got us started with his hit and then Cato LaCroix knocked him in."

DeRosa wasn't overly concerned about the lack of offense.

"I just pitched and hoped for the best," he said.

"I didn't think that one run would be all we'd get," said LaCroix. "But our pitcher did pretty well so that's all we needed."

But DeRosa's effort on the mound and a flawless defense behind him made that one skinny run hold up after all.

"I thought our defense played very well behind Nick," said Sullivan. "Mike Maresca played particularly well in center field."

Left fielder Shane Hanley accounted for exactly half of Ashland's offense, going 3-for-3 with a pair of singles and a double.

Somerville, which has lost three one-run games, fell to 0-6 with the loss.

Ashland is scheduled to travel Tyngsboro tonight for a 5:45 p.m. contest.

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Erik Watkins erased any doubt in his manager's mind.

Watkins ended the night 3-for-4 with three runs, four RBI and a solo home run to help Post 191 to a 9-3 victory over Post 77 at Feeley Field.

"(Erik) Watkins is our glue," said Noce, whose team improved to 9-4. "He bats second, but he's hitting more like a three or four hitter for us right now. He's getting a lot of line drives and guessing a lot of pitches correctly."

"He was throwing a lot of different pitches at us tonight," Watkins said of his battles at the plate with Ashland starter Mitch Corbitt. "I just happened to guess right on a couple of pitches and drive them to the outfield. He was a pretty good pitcher, but I just got lucky I guess."

Sudbury's top three batters - leadoff hitter Matt Tatkow, Watkins and David Baer - combined to go 6-for-11 with six runs and five RBI, but Post 191 had trouble early on against Corbitt.

Ashland (5-6) scored the game's first runs when Nick DeRosa hit a double that plated leadoff hitter Jonathan Ho and Pat Curtis to put Ashland up 2-0.

After the inning, Curtis left the game with a wrist injury.

"Obviously, it hurts whenever you lose a guy like that in your lineup," said Ashland manager Dan Sullivan. "He is clearly one of our better hitters and hopefully he checks out at the doctor's tomorrow."

Corbitt held the Sudbury lineup in check as he retired six of the first seven batters he faced. But Post 191 got to him in the third inning, recording five straight hits to start the frame leading to four runs.

"Four or five days off is never good for the bats," Noce said. "It's nice to get the pitching some rest, but we saw tonight how it took our bats a little while to wake up."

Ricky Antonellis and Dana Duquette started the third-inning rally with consecutive singles and Tatkow (2-for-4, 2 runs, RBI) followed with an RBI double. Watkins then belted a two-run double off the wall, and after a Baer single Mike Baranowsky grounded into a double play scoring Watkins from third to make it 4-2. Baer finished 2-for-4 with a run.

"Once we started hitting we really turned up the heat," said Noce.

"Mitch (Corbitt) started leaving his fastball up in the zone and they made him pay for it," Sullivan said. "I thought he pitched well today, but he just made a couple of mistakes against a very good hitting team."

Sudbury tacked on another run in the fourth on a solo home run by Watkins that cleared the left field fence to put Post 191 up 5-2.

"He (Corbitt) threw me a curveball and a change so I was looking for the high fastball because I knew he was going to try and throw it by me," Watkins said.

In the fifth, Ashland made it 5-3 when Luke Cuneo hit a leadoff double and scored on Colin Sullivan's single. Sudbury brought reliever Matt McGavick in, and after striking out Cato LaCroix, he got DeRosa to ground into an inning-ending double play.

"I thought that was a big moment in the game," said Sullivan. "Their pitchers did a great job in relief and got out of that inning with just the one run."

Sudbury extended its lead to 6-3 in the fifth on an RBI double from Danny Cakert and added three more runs in the seventh inning. Watkins singled in Tatkow and then scored with Baer on a throwing error by the shortstop on a grounder by pinch-hitter Trevor Hiller.

Reliever Ryan McDonald came on in the seventh to close out the game for Sudbury.

"We hit into some tough outs today," Sullivan said. "Hopefully, we worked the kinks out today because we have a nice stretch coming up (six games in nine days) to close out the season."