Playoff baseball was back at Holman Stadium on Tuesday night.

And Finals baseball is on its way. See you on Thursday for Game 2 of the Futures Collegiate Baseball League championship series between the Nashua Silver Knights and the defending champion, second-year Vermont Lake Monsters.

That postseason feelng was back at Holman for the first time since the Silver Knights won it all on a late August Saturday night in 2020. The Finals Feel will be here in a day.

“It’s awesome,” he said. “It was only two years since we had it and it felt like an eternity.”

But the wait is over. Nashua’s pitching simply smothered a good hitting team in the New Britain Bees, and the offense was in extra-base form.

We should have known. Former Knights outfielder Cam Cruz, who played with Cook on those title teams from 2016-17, was at the park “and I think he’s ready to put on a jersey,” Cook said with a chuckle.

Cruz simply won.

So does Tuesday night’s Knights starting pitcher, Londonderry’s Nolan Lincoln, who was incredible with six innings of shutout, one-hit ball. He’s already got a championship ring with Eastern Connecticut and feels there’s another one waiting for him. He and his team had no doubts it would still be playing later in this week.

“Absolutely we were thinking finals,” “This team’s special. We have a good relationship with everyone. I always knew that if we put it all together, we are not a team that many people want to face.”

You might want to say that about the Lake Monsters as owner Chris English, who used to own the Nashua Pride, has built a powerhouse. They won a whopping 44 regular season games and at one point, dating back to last year, had dominated Nashua with 14 straight wins. But the Knights got on track and this season won five of 12 against them, including three in Vermont.

English has been back to Holman (he used to own the Brockton Rox) but no doubt he’ll feel that familiar playoff atmosphere that he enjoyed with the Pride. Fans cheering with every pitch.

Last night’s game was so quick, by the time most of the crowd had filed in the game was nearly half over. That’s what good pitching will do. But the crowd was chanting at the end.

So expect the unexpected.

“Anything can happen,” Jackson said. “I think a lot of people doubted us after our start at the beginning of the year.

“They’ve proven everybody wrong, including myself. It was a tough road. I always had faith in them, but they just had to believe in themselves and trust their stuff.”

Cook and Jackson made some moves late to replace players who were either hurt or back to school. Brady O’Brien at shorstop, Tuesday’s homer hero Kyle DeRoma. And those who have been here most of the year are playing their best ball, like second baseman Jack McDermott, who had two moon shots on Monday in New Britain.

“It’s kind of the Silver Knights in a vacuum,” Cook said. “It’s a different team every year, but something happens, as long as we get into the playoffs, we find ourselves in this position.

“McDermott had zero home runs in 200 at bats, and he has two in the first game of the post season. DeRoma we picked up right before the postseason deadline.

“We’re doing it with (Division) III studs and incoming freshmen, and then we go to our Wake Forest guy (reliever Will Andrews) to finish it out. We’ve got all our angles covered.

“It doesn’t matter who, doesn’t matter where, we’ll just attack it head on.”

Where is UVM’s Centennial Field tonight and then Holman on Thursday.

Feel it.

Tom King can be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com, or on twitter @Telegraph _TomK.

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