It’s the nature of baseball — or any other sport. One moment can be glorious, and the next one can be just as grisly.
Such was the case for the baseball Cazenovia Lakers, who went on the road and stunned defending state Class B champion Westhill 8-5 on April 4 — only to get ambushed two days later, at home, by Marcellus in an 18-4 defeat.
It started out in a normal manner, with Cazenovia falling behind 1-0 in the second inning — a small concern, but nothing to fret about.
Then came the top of the third.
No matter what it tried, the Lakers simply couldn’t get anybody out. Marcellus hit around the order twice, helped in no small part by a long list of fielding mistakes — Cazenovia would finish with nine errors.
It didn’t end until the Mustangs had gained 15 runs in that single frame, and it got to 18-0 before the Lakers finally scored in the fifth inning, then tacked on three more runs in the bottom of the seventh.
Brian Gara took the loss, with Jeff Hopsicker and Chris Loretz seeing relief duty. Ben Davis drove in two runs as Forest Blanchard added an RBI. Nick Sinay led Marcellus with four RBIs as Zach Amidon hit the game’s only home run.
The challenges continued Wednesday, at Bishop Ludden, and while the Lakers did contain the Gaelic Knights’ potent lineup most of the way, it still lost a 5-0 decision.
Mostly, It was a game of lost opportunities. Over the first four innings, Cazenovia put nine runners on base — and stranded all of them, unable to get the one run-scoring hit off Ryan O’Kane it needed to hang close.
Max Kellish, for the most part, pitched well. But he made one big mistake — hanging a pitch to Ludden clean-up hitter Chris Davis in the bottom of the first with two men on base. Davis sent it over the left-center field fence for a three-run home run, all the offense O’Kane would need. Hopsicker saw late relief duty.
