Telegraph photo by TOM KING The Nashua Silver Knights were in a celebratory mood after their walkoff win Saturday night over North Shore at Holman Stadium.

NASHUA – His teammates surrounded Nick Shumski and took the celebration all the way to the outfield at the end of Saturday night’s classic encounter with the North Shore Navigators at Holman Stadium.

Why? Because Shumski’s single gave Nashua a walk-off win to hand a team the Silver Knights don’t really like too much, the North Shore Navigators, their first loss of the season.

The games between the two can be intense. For example, Silver Knights Kyle Jackson got ejected for arguing a call in the top of the eighth in this past Friday night’s first game of the home-at-home series at Fraser Field in Lynn, Mass.

There are two former Silver Knights on the Navs, including highly touted shortstop Cody Morissette and slugger Alex Brickman. Morissette, a top player out of Boston College, tried to hook on back with Nashua after the Cape Cod League cancelled its season but was told the roster was full. When the Knights finally cleared a space, it was too late as he had already signed with North Shore.

And, while there are nowhere near as many summer college leagues as usual due to the pandemic, the Navs were ranked the sixth best such team in the country recently.

“That’s a great team,” Jackson said of the Navs. “Up and down the lineup. They’ll pound on the mistakes by a pitcher. It doesn’t matter, whether it’s 82 (miles an hour) or 94. If you leave it up, they’re going to hit it.”

And the rivalry is huge, perhaps as big as Nashua’s rivalry with its owner’s other team, the Worcester Bravehearts. Remember, North Shore eliminated Nashua in the first round of last year’s FCBL playoffs.

“We play them 11 times,” Jackson said. “I think in two weeks we have them back-to-back-to back. But to see that (win), even I was skipping down the line.”

Indeed, Nashua does play North Shore three straight times next week: at Holman on Wednesday, July 22; at North Shore on July 23, and back in Nashua on July 24.

“The Navs are 6-0,” Shumski said. “We kept hearing they’re the greatest team in the Futures League. We wanted to give them their first loss.”

Predictably, Jackson pulled out all the stops on Saturday, having his team run the bases as much as it could.

“That’s a game I would want to go watch,” Jackson said. “Whether we won or we lost. You started hearing the cow bells when a man got on. I told the team I’m aggressive. I will never get on them for trying to beat out a ball. I’m going to steal, I’m going to do everything I can.”

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Salem’s Shumski, who has a grad year of baseball eligibility at Merrimack, has been a veteran leader for the Knights.

Knights general manager Cam Cook scooped him up after he had played last year with Brockton.

“Great kid,” Jackson said. “He brings good leadership. He’s been in the league, has a good attitude. He’s one of the leaders on the team, always up and cheering, great defenively, hitting, he has a great feel for the game. Very mature.”

Shumski loves playing in Nashua.

“My parents make it to every game, I’ve got friends coming to the game,” he said. “It’s good to have them come see me play. I love the Futures League.”

Yes, Shumski couldn’t be happier.

“It’s nice being close to home,” he said. “We’ve got a great group of guys here, everyone’s hungry and wants to win. I wanted to keep playing baseball.”

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Nashua actually has a former North Shore player, but that didn’t happen until Saturday. In fact, former Navs outfielder Thomas Crowley, who is from Merrimack College and lives in Dracut, Mass., may have thought he was going to play for North Shore Saturday night until he got word just before or around the time he was headed to Holman. He got his release so Nashua could sign him.

Crowley actually had a chance to get instant revenge on his former team before Shumski drove in the game winner but fanned for the second out.

“Deep down with Crowley, I wanted him to get that walk-off, coming from North Shore,” Jackson said. “He’s a great kid and he’s going to get the opportunity to play here, because I think he’s only got five at bats at North Shore.”

Nashua right fielder Jared Dupere got hurt on Friday night in the game at Lynn, Mass. so the team was in need of an outfielder. But Jackson said he wanted Crowley anyway. He got word from his Merrimack teammate Shumski that Crowley wasn’t happy because he wasn’t playing.

“And I don’t blame him,” Jackson said. “Everyone plays on my team. Any pitchers, any position players. They’ll all get their at-bats.”

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There are a couple of changes on Nashua’s schedule. To make it easier on the Westfield (Mass.) Starfires in terms of travel, the team eliminated the Sunday, Aug. 2 game at Holman and scheduled a doubleheader for Saturday, July 25, at 3 and 6 p.m. Both games will be seven innings.

That will be Westfield’s only Holman appearance. The Silver Knights make two trips to the western Mass.town, this Friday at 6 p.m. as well as the last game of the regular season on Wednesday, Aug. 19.

The other Knights change is simply a time change. The July 28 game vs. Worcester was on some schedules originally an 11 a.m.game for youth camps but has since been moved to a regular weekday 6 p.m. start….

Nashua has just one home game this week, tonight at 6 vs. Brockton.

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