Snow that lingered into April made it impossible for local high school baseball teams to play on local fields early in the school break.
However, it warmed up – and cleared up – enough on Thursday to have Fayetteville-Manlius and Jamesville-DeWitt both enter the 2013 competitive fray, and both find success.
For the Hornets, a perennial Class AA title contender, that meant going to Falcon Park to face Auburn, and some big late-game production helped F-M smash the Maroons 9-2.
Trailing 1-0, the Hornets tied it in the top of the fourth inning, and then exploded for five runs in the fifth and three runs in the sixth.
J.P. Quinn led the way with two hits, three runs scored and a pair of RBIs. Mike Hoalcraft and Taylor Smach each drove in two runs to match Quinn’s production, while Jack McClure managed two hits and an RBI.
McClure also pitched four innings to earn the win, striking out seven, with Sean Brown and Jackson Wheeler offering solid support in relief as F-M played error-free defense, a rare sight in an early-season games.
As for J-D, snowed out of its first two games with East Syracuse-Minoa and Fulton, it hosted Oneida on Thursday and got a pitching gem from Chris McGee in a 2-0 shutout of the Indians.
McGee tossed a complete-game one-hitter, surrendering three walks while recording eight strikeouts. All the run support McGee needed came in the top of the second thanks to Sam Crisalli’s two-run home run that drove home John Werbowky, who finished with a pair of hits.
