One more victory by each side would mean that the Cicero-North Syracuse and Liverpool baseball teams would settle the Section III Class AA championship against each other.
Just getting to that point, though, required surviving Thursday’s close, tense AA quarterfinals, where the top-seeded Northstars edged no. 8 seed Syracuse 3-2 in 10 innings at the Gillette Road complex, and the no. 6 seed Warriors upended no. 3 seed Rome Free Academy 2-1 in eight innings at DeLutis Field.
Much of the spotlight was on C-NS, for good reason. The top seed did not give the Northstars any sort of favor because waiting for them was Syracuse (who had beaten Fayetteville-Manlius 4-2 in the opening round) and its highly touted junior left-hander, Jeff Belge, who had not pitched in either of his team’s two regular-season meetings.
C-NS left-hander Steven Theetge had pitched in those games, though, shutting out Syracuse 1-0 on April 18 and again by a 3-0 margin on May 4. And Theetge was on the mound again here, managing to top both of those previous starts due to the stakes and the amount of work involved.
Perfect through two innings, Theetge only cracked once, in the top of the third, loading the bases with nobody before Colin Thompson hit into a double play, which scored a run. Brian Nolan walked, and when he ran toward second base, Theetge picked hom off – but not before Ben Atkinson scored.
Trailing 2-0, C-NS got one run back in the third. Belge was ringing up strikeouts, but also having control problems, allowing Jake McArdell to reach on a dropped third strike with two out. A wild pitch sent McArdell to second, and Theetge singled him home.
The Northstars trailed 2-1 until the bottom of the sixth where, again, Belge’s wildness caught up to him. A two-out walk to Theetge, plus a sacrifice bunt and wild pitch, put pinch-runner Luke Dziados on third, and he raced home on yet another passed ball to tie it.
Belge exited after the seventh inning, having struck out 15 but walked seven. Pat Myers relieved him and was perfect for two frames, something that Theetge matched.
At no point, said Theetge, did he want to leave, eventually working his total to 125 pitches by the 10th inning and matching Belge’s 15-strikeout total while only allowing two hits and two walks.
Still, it didn’t end until the bottom of the 10th. Christian LaLoma led off with a single. McArdell singled, and Theetge singled to load the bases. After Mike Sciore struck out, Steven Kires stepped to the plate – and Myers’ first delivery hit Kires, allowing LaLoma to walk home with the winning run.
While all this was going on, Liverpool, who had finished its regular season finishing off a 9-4 victory over CBA in a game that started on May 11 but got postponed, found itself in its own thriller at DeLutis Field against a determined Rome Free Academy side.
A first-inning run got the Warriors in front, Jonah Harder walking and later scoring on Jake Pieklik’s hit, and Bobby Zywicki pitched well in the early going, mowing down Black Knights batters.
Zywicki only slipped once, in the bottom of the fourth, when RFA tied it, 1-1. But from there, Zywicki again shut the door and, on his way to a complete-game three-hitter that included seven strikeouts, waited for some help.
It arrived from a familiar pair in the top of the eighth. Again, Harder reached base and, again, Pieklik drove him home with the go-ahead run. Then Zywicki recorded the final three outs.
Each of the Class AA semifinals take place Sunday at the Onondaga Community College Complex. at 4 p.m., Liverpool tries to upend no. 2 seed West Genesee, followed by C-NS taking on no. 4 seed and defending champion Auburn at 7 p.m. In both cases, the Warriors and Northstars are trying to avenge two regular-season defeats to their respective opponents.
