CENTRAL NEW YORK- Come Sunday afternoon at Onondaga Community College, the West Genesee baseball team faces a simple problem whose equation could put an end to 47 long years of waiting for a Section III championship.
All the Wildcats had to do was beat Whitesboro in the Class AA final, and the championship drought that dates back to 1977 is over.
On that same OCC turf Thursday night, WG nearly had this latest title quest end, but survived an eight-inning battle with no. 5 seed Central Square, edging the Redhawks 2-1.
Having seen Whitesboro survive its own nine-inning battle to beat Auburn 5-4 in the other semifinal, the Wildcats found itself in a similarly tense game that featured tremendous pitching on both sides.
After Talon Elkins scored Nick Meluni on a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the first, Central Square replaced starter Chase Enright with Nico Garlic in the third inning, and Garlic spent the next five frames keeping WG off the board.
Meanwhile, Landyn Shaw got the start for the Wildcats and still had a 1-0 lead when Central Square’s Dominick Ciccone singled, made it around to third and scored on Mason Baye’s grounder.
Once Collin Crinnin took over in the fifth, though, the Redhawks were shut down. Crinnin traded zeroes with Garlic through the sixth and seventh and then pitched a scoreless eighth, too, only allowing one hit and striking out five.
That work got rewarded in the bottom of the eighth when Jacob Severson led off with single, then moved to third on consecutive grounders by Jason Clifton and Joe Cavallo. That left it to Luis Garcia, whose clutch single scored Severson with the game-winner.
Earlier in the day, Westhill, in Class A, and Bishop Ludden, in Class C, won their respective sectional quarterfinals.
The no. 4 seed Warriors, hosting no. 5 seed Cortland, simply scored early and let the great pitching of Ryan Campbell do the rest to deliver a 4-0 win over the Purple Tigers.
Two runs in the bottom of the first off Zach Muir got Westhill in front, with two more runs to follow in the fourth. Only Campbell picked up a pair of hits as Mike Madigan, Dom Zawadzki, T.J. Pichoske and Eric Holstein all crossed the plate.
Campbell didn’t need much help, though. From start to finish, he baffled Cortland’s batters, limiting them to five hits and walking two while striking out seven and advancing Westhill to Saturday’s semifinal at OCC against top seed Jamesville-DeWitt, who had to rally late to beat South Jefferson 3-2.
As for Ludden, the top seed in Class C, who blanked Altmar-Parish-Williamstown 10-0 in the opening round, kept it up May 23 with a 7-1 win over no. 8 seed LaFayette in the quarterfinals.
Having beat the Lancers twice in the regular season, the Gaelic Knights found the third encounter the most difficult, seeing LaFayette keep the bats quiet and tie it, 1-1, in the top of the fifth as Cameron Burns singled and scored.
Immediately answering, Ludden broke it open with five runs in the bottom of the fifth, led by Jimmy Westers, who finished with a single, double and three RBIs. Parker Pichoske had two hits and scored twice as he joined Greg Purdy in the RBI column.
That cushion was more than enough for pitcher Joe Dunham, who walked three and gave up four hits, but amassed 13 strikeouts as Ludden advanced to Saturday’s Class C semifinal at Utica’s Murnane Field against no. 4 seed Mount Markham.
