Newington — Members of the Waterford Little League (11-12) baseball team had been taking turns terrorizing opponents in state tournament play, piling up runs like Taylor Swift does her closet with awards.

Waterford hadn't faced a pitcher like Mickey Gurzenda, though. The diminutive lefty from Southington South stifled Waterford's bats on Sunday afternoon and prevented it from clinching the state title Sunday, winning 4-2 at Volunteer Field to force a decisive championship game on Monday

"That's why baseball is great because you've got guys who can come out and throw really hard like the kid from Stamford North that we faced (earlier)," Waterford manager Tim Burrows said. "Then you have a kid (like Gurzenda) who just throws curve ball after curve ball, then mixed in a fastball. He was a good pitcher.

"We haven't seen a pitcher like that. We haven't seen a lefty like that."

Today's winner-take-all final will be played at 7 p.m. The winner advances to the New England Regional tournament in Bristol beginning Monday, Aug. 10.

Waterford scored no less than 11 runs in five of its six state tournament games, outscoring opponents 73-35. Its lone loss was to Newington in the Division 3 state tournament (12-2).

"I saw them when they played Stamford North," Southington South manager Chris LaPorte said. "It was 4-4 going into extra innings and they put up 11 runs on the board in one inning, so they've got the bats that could erupt at any time."

Gurzenda allowed just two hits over 4.2 innings with eight strikeouts and one earned run before being removed after passing the Little League-mandated 85 pitch (per game) limit. Only one of those two hits got out of the infield.

"Lefties already have movement on the ball," LaPorte said. "He named (his breaking ball), too. I think he calls it the 'circle drop.' It's his pitch."

Sean Olson struck out three of the batters he faced to earn the save and gave up just one single.

Southington South led the majority of the game. It fell behind, 2-1, in the top of the fourth, but took back control in the bottom of that inning.

Jake Neuman singled to lead off the inning and moved to second on Gurzenda's one-out single. Drew Belcourt followed with a three-run home run over the left-centerfield fence to put Southington South back ahead, 4-2.

Jake Napoli led off the Southington South first with a home run.

Gurzenda retired nine of the first 10 batters he faced when Luke Sokolski beat out a groundball for an infield single, Waterford's first hit of the game.

Sokolski (two hits) took second on a wild pitch and scored on Trey Brennan's two-out single.

Ben Jerome walked to load the bases. Brennan was forced in when Connor Podeszwa walked.

"They're heads are in a good place," Burrows said. "They'll be okay."

n.griffen@theday.com

Twitter: @MetalNED