When the Section III Class B playoff bracket came out, the Cazenovia baseball team had to like what it saw, at least in terms of the opening rounds.
With a no. 4 seed thanks to its 8-4 league record that created a share of the OHSL Liberty division regular-season title with Skaneateles, the Lakers had nothing but opponents unfamiliar with its strengths and weaknesses at the outset.
That included Canastota, the no. 13 seed, who ventured to the Sean Googin Sports Complex for the May 22 opening-round game and ran right into Cazenovia pitching ace Will Fellows, who controlled things from start to finish in a 4-0 shutout of the Raiders.
All season long, Fellows had shown an ability to take over, and he did so here, too, limiting Canastota to just three hits, two of them by Anthony Sicilia, while overcoming four walks to record eight strikeouts.
For its part, the Lakers were patient at the plate against Sicilia, who also started on the mound for the Raiders, and got a run in the first inning, plus two runs in the fourth, to take control. Jake Purdy replaced Sicilia, but Cazenovia got a run off him in the fifth, too, to add to the margin.
To help his own cause, Fellows scored twice, while Drew Devendorf managed a double, single and RBI. Jacob Schettine also drove in a run as Devendorf and Ryman Seeley crossed the plate.
This led to the May 24 Class B quarterfinal against no. 4 seed Frankfort-Schuyler, who had romped past Adirondack 17-0 in its opening-round game, but was stepping up a level of competition to deal with the Lakers.
Yet the Maroon Knights were up to that challenge, getting within one strike of a victory in regulation, and then absorbing the shock of that seventh-inning situation before going on to eliminate the Lakers 5-1 in nine innings.
From the outset, F-S pitcher Mike Spina kept Cazenovia’s batters in check, striking out the side in the first and stranding two Cazenovia runners in the second. Meanwhile, Laker pitcher Kevin Ridings did the same to the Maroon Knights, and it remained 0-0 into the sixth.
And then it got crazy.
F-S put two runners in scoring position in the top of the sixth, and thought it put home the go-ahead runs on a missed tag at first, but the home plate umpire overruled his colleague, negating the two runs and keeping it scoreless.
But in the top of the seventh, Parker Goldsmith tripled off Ridings, and Shawn Welch singled him home, putting the Maroon Knights up 1-0. Protecting that slim lead, Spina surrendered a single to Cornell in the bottom of the seventh, but Cornell was picked off.
When Schettine grounded out, Cazenovia was down to its last out. Staying patient, Billy Rankin walked, and then Noah King put together an epic at-bat, fouling off three two-strike pitches to stay alive.
On the fourth do-or-die pitch, Spina threw wildly, and Rankin made it to second, only to see the throw sail wide and Rankin, hustling all the way, sped around to the plate and scored the tying run. Incredibly, it was 1-1, and it stayed that way through an eighth inning.
Now it was the top of the ninth. When Ridings surrendered a single and walk, he was pulled for Peter DeCew, only to see DeCew walk Goldsmith to load the bases. Up stepped Welch, and he promptly singled home two F-S runs. Another walk followed, and now Cornell took his turn on the mound, only to throw two wild pitchers that plated Goldsmith and Welch.
Trailing by four, Cazenovia could not answer in the bottom of the ninth as Spina finished a complete-game, 10-strikeout effort and the Maroon Knights advanced to the semifinal against top seed Westhill, while the Lakers finished its season with a 12-10 mark.
