Tyrone shelled the Bellwood-Antis baseball team for six runs in the third inning at Harry Sickler Athletic Complex on Wednesday afternoon, then added what proved to be the winning run in the sixth to knock off backyard rival Bellwood-Antis 9-8.
The Blue Devils rolled across a pair of runs in their first at bat to take the early lead, but Tyrone scored once in each of the first two innings and came back in the third to stretch out to an 8-2 advantage.
Bellwood-Antis changed pitchers and came back to put six runs on the board and had runners at the corners in the top of the seventh, including the possible tying run at third base, when Ben Gummo struck out Shawn Weiand on a full-count fastball to secure the slim one-run win for the Golden Eagles. Brandon Maceno picked up the win allowing eight runs, five earned striking out four and walking four, scattering 14 hits. Ben Gummo picks up a save with his one hitter, one strikeout performance.
“When that count went three and two, “ recounted Tyrone coach Tom Coleman, “number three hitter and he had hit Maceno fairly well, that’s why we brought Ben Gummo in, he made some good pitches. To the last strike, I had a hard time just looking out there. This was a hard-fought game. Bellwood could easily have laid down in the fourth inning when we were ahead 8-2, they fought back and made it interesting.”
Andy Brisbin opened the game by drawing a walk. Weiand singled to send Brisbin to third base. Chris Alley singled in Brisbin and Weiand scored on a Brandon Maceno wild pitch.
Tyrone countered that when Barry Gummo singled, moved around to third on a single by Ben Gummo. Brice Mertiff got the run home with a sacrifice fly to right field. In the second, the Eagles knotted the score when Jeremy Myers, courtesy running for Derrick Soellner, who had walked, scored on an RBI single by Barry Gummo.
“We just have a bunch of athletes out there,” explained Coleman, whose Eagles have hit in double figures in every ballgame this year. “They put the ball in play and one-through-nine has been hitting the ball since the beginning of the season. They are just good hitters, we work hard on that in practice. We just need to work now on defense.”
Then with the aid of a fly ball that was dropped and a couple more outs that probably should have been recorded, Tyrone scored six times to take a big 8-2 lead. Eleven hitters paraded to the plate for the Eagles and eight of them reached base. Brinton Mingle singled in Mertiff who had been safe on the error, Soellner singled to drive in Mingle, Nick Cushion singled in Maceno and Myers, again running for Soellner, Ben Gummo scored Jason Wilson, who was hit by a pitch, with a sac fly and Mertiff completed the scoring with an RBI single that plated Cushion.
“Our starting pitching has to do better, and we can’t give them five and six outs an inning,” said Bellwood-Antis coach Steve Conlon. “We made some great plays on defense, but we have to make the routine play. That one inning hurt. Our first kid was just working up in the zone, his curveball was hanging. The second kid, Chris Alley did a wonderful job holding Tyrone to one run the rest of the game.”
Chris Alley relieved B-A starter Troy Brunner and tossed the final three and 2/3 innings to settle Tyrone down. Alley allowed just three hits and one run, striking out two and walking one. Brunner, who took the loss, allowed eight runs, five earned on nine hits, with one K and two walks.
Both teams had a runner thrown out at home trying to score by a throw from the outfield. The Blue Devils Kyle Drost was thrown out in the fifth inning trying to score from second on a base hit to center by Barry Gummo throwing to Tyrone catcher Derrick Soellner. Tyrone Tyler Golden, pinch running for Clint Wilson tried to score in the sixth on a hit when B-A left fielder Bill Luke fired a strike to Weiand at home plate.
Bellwood-Antis refused to roll over and play dead.
In the fifth, Nick Treese singled and Weiand walked to start the frame. Alley scored Treese with a single, Brunner scored Weiand from third with a fielder’s choice and Alley scored when the ball was thrown away. With two outs, Kyle Drost doubled to center to score Brunner to slice the Tyrone margin to 8-6.
The Blue Devils narrowed the Eagles’ advantage to a single tally in the sixth inning. Brisbin singled, but was forced by Treese for the first out. Maceno, who pitched a whale of a game, throwing 137 pitches, got Weiand to fly out, but walked Alley and yielded a single to Brunner that scored Treese.
With the Blue Devils breathing down the Golden Eagles necks, Tyrone scored what would be the winning run in the bottom of the sixth. Brice Mertiff lead off the frame by blasting a triple to center. Alley got Mingle to ground out to third, with Treese looking the runner back and firing to first for the out. Clint Wilson came through with a huge hit, doubling to right-center to get Mertiff home.
“The throw from Barry Gummo to get the runner at home and then the run we manufactured in the sixth were real keys in this game,” explained Coleman. “This was a good game all around. At the beginning of the season we set our goals to take one game, make the plays, do the fundamentals. We have the pitching and experience. a couple of years ago, we had five or six freshmen start for us. That helps a lot. We are off to a good start. I hope we can continue this the whole way up until the playoffs and then get hot and see what happens. Look at what Bellwood did last year.”
Bellwood-Antis had three more outs to try and nearly pulled out the victory.
“The kids did a great job battling back,” said Conlon. “You can’t ask for any more than that. At the end we had the right man up. The kids did a good job getting Shawn up. They know that is who we want in that situation. Today he just didn’t come through. Next game hopefully he will come through. We are kind of a ‘Dr. Jeckyll, Mr. Hyde’ team. We are so young. You never know which team will show up for any given game. We had 14 hits today and 16 last game, but we went through a stretch where we had two or three hits a game, days where we make diving catches and days where we miss routine balls. Sometimes with this young team, we give away ballgames.”
Adam DeArmitt doubled to open the seventh. With Maceno still on the mound. Pitching on heart alone, the right-hander retired L. J. Seidel on a liner to second and Bill Luke on a short fly ball. Brisbin beat out an infield single and Treese followed with the second straight infield hit to deep short to score DeArmitt to cut the Tyrone lead to 9-8. Tyrone coach Tom Coleman brought in Ben Gummo to face Weiand and although it came right down to the final pitch, Weiand swung and missed a Gummo fastball to nail down the Eagles fifth win in six games, while the Blue Devils fall to 4-3.
Tyrone hosts Claysburg-Kimmel on Friday at 4 p.m.. Bellwood-Antis will face Bishop Guilfoyle at 4 p.m. on Saturday at Blair County Ballpark in a first round contest of the Dean Patterson Curve Classic.
Tyrone 9 Bellwood-Antis 8
BELLWOOD-ANTIS – Brisbin, 2b, 4-1-2; Treese, 3b, 4-2-2; Weiand, c, 4-2-1; Alley, ss-p, 3-1-2; Brunner, p-rf, 4-1-1; McClellan, 1b, 4-0-0; DeArmitt, cf, 4-1-2; Seidel, rf, 1-0-0; Drost, ss, 3-0-2; Luke, lf, 4-0-2. TOTALS 35-8-14.
TYRONE – Ba. Gummo, cf, 3-1-2; Be. Gummo, ss-p, 3-0-1; Mertiff, 2b-ss, 3-2-2; Mingle, rf, 4-1-2; C. Wilson, 4-0-1; Golden, pr, 0-0-0; Maceno, p-2b, 4-1-1; D. Soellner, c, 2-0-1; Myers, cr, 0-2-0; J. Wilson, lf, 2-1-1; Cushion, 3b, 2-1-1. TOTALS 27-9-12.
Bellwood-Antis 200 041 1 8-14-1.
Tyrone 116 001 X 9-12-1.
2B: BA- Drost 1, DeArmitt 1, T- C. Wilson 1.
3B: T- Mertiff 1.
RBI: BA- Alley 2, Brunner 2, Treese 1, Drost 1, T- Mertiff 2, Cushion 2, Ba. Gummo 1, Be. Gummo 1, Mingle 1, C. Wilson 1, D. Soellner 1.
SO: BA- Brunner 1, Alley 2, T- Maceno 4, Be. Gummo 1.
BB: BA- Brunner 2, Alley 1, T- Maceno 4.
WP: Maceno LP: Brunner SV: Be. Gummo
