Bison See Another Late Lead Slip Away in 6-4 Loss

BELLEFONTE — Bellefonte rallied for five runs, all unearned, in the bottom of the sixth inning to hand Clearfield a 6-4 setback in Mountain League schoolboy baseball action Monday.

Thomas Summers and the Bison were cruising along with a 4-1 lead when an error opened the door, and the Red Raiders charged through with the help of a walk and second miscue.

Tanner Day capped the comeback with a two-run single off reliever Brandon Orsich for the game-winning hit. Dom Masullo and Trent Fortney had run-scoring singles.

Shutdown pitching by Taylor Butts enabled Bellefonte (5-13, 4-10) to be in position to pull out the win after Clearfield (3-14, 2-10 ML) jumped in front 4-0 against starter Logan Mathieu.

Logan Puit walked and scored on Cole Kephart’s sacrifice fly in the first inning, and the Bison tallied three more runs in the second without the benefit of a hit, thanks to three walks, two Red Raider errors and a double steal.

After Mathieu issued his fifth and six free passes, Butts stepped into a bases-loaded, one-out situation and worked out of the jam with a strikeout and a flyout.

He went on to allow only one hit, a two-out single by Curtis Collins in the seventh inning, and three walks to pick up the victory. Two of the Bison who received free passes were erased on double plays in the last two frames.

Collins also had Clearfield’s lone hit off Mathieu, a first-inning single.

Summers struck out seven but wound up the hard-luck loser after limiting the Red Raiders to a third-inning run on four singles before the misfortune occurred in the sixth.

The defeat was the ninth by one or two runs for Clearfield, which has two more Mountain League make-up games, Tuesday in its home finale against Philipsburg-Osceola and Wednesday at Tyrone.

CLEARFIELD — 4

Zach Timchak rf 0000, Brandon Orsich p 0000, Logan Puit dh 1100, Spencer Herrington ss 3000, Curtis Collins lf 3020, Cole Kephart 3b 3001, Josh Sorbera c 3000, Jon Janocko 1b 1100, Erik Sellers 2b 1100, Thomas Summers p-rf 2100, Nate Brady cr 0000, Sawyer Rowles cf 2000, Dan Collins ph 1000.  TOTALS: 20  4  2  1.

BELLEFONTE — 6

Andrew Stover c 4010, Tanner Day cf 4132, Taylor Butts 1b-p 3020, Doylan Dietrich ss 4121, Adam Kuhn 3b 3000, Josh Weaver rf 3100, Logan Mathieu p 0000, Dom Masullo 1b 1111, Zach Musser dh 2000, Darren Heeman ss 1000, Trent Fortney ss 2111, Ian Marshall lf 1000, Jonny Glunt lf 1110.  TOTALS: 29  6  10  5.

Score by Innings

Clearfield     130 000 0 – 4   2  3
Bellefonte    001 005 x – 6  10  2
E – Herrington 2, Sellers; Stover, Mathieu. DP – Bellefonte 2 (Fortney, Dietrich and Masullo; Masullo unassisted). LOB – Clearfield 6; Bellefonte 7. Sac – Summers. SF – Kephart. SB – Puit, Brady; Day. CS – Stover (by Summers).

Pitching

Clearfield – Summers 5-2/3 IP, 9 H, 6 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K; Orsich 1/3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 1 K.
Bellefonte – Mathieu 1-1/3 IP, 1 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 6 BB, 1 K; Butts 5-2/3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 1 K.
WP – Summers 1.
W – Butts. L – Summers (1-5).

Bison Scoreboard: