CURWENSVILLE — Having to wait for over a week to even get on the field has been difficult for the Curwensville Golden Tide baseball team. Game after game was moved because of rain, or field conditions were not good for playing. Finally, the Tide got to start their 2022 season on Tuesday afternoon on their home field, hosting the Williamsburg Pirates.
All that pent up frustration was a challenge for the home team at the game’s start, but the heart of the team came through, as Curwensville pulled off a late-game rally to take the 5-2 victory to start the new season.
Third-base coach Isaac Graham, who was filling in as head coach for Tom Harzinski due to a personal matter, was ecstatic for the team for how they came back in a tough spot.
“We’ve had four-straight rainouts, the kids were getting tired of being bottled up inside, and tired of practicing. We wanted to play, and obviously, we were a little rusty in the beginning, but shook that off,” he said. “We just played baseball, and executed when we needed to.”
Starting pitcher Jake Mullins opened the game with a walk, but suddenly during the second at-bat he began wincing in pain. Trainers came out to check on him, as he was favoring his neck and his arm. The Pirates took some time to talk with their coaches, while Graham had the fielders take some time to stay loose, tossing the ball around. After a few minutes, Mullins returned to the mound, and the at-bat continued. Mullins finished the inning, but saw the first run come home when Dylan Shawver got hit on a bases loaded 2-2 pitch. One batter later, Luke Uplinger bunted in a run on an infield single to make it 2-0. A line out and fly out would end the inning.
On the opposite side, Liam McGregor had to shake of an opening error and a pair of walks to keep the Tide at bay and scoreless. He would hold that advantage through the early part of the fifth inning, but then saw things quickly change. With runners on second and third, Spencer Hoover took the first pitch and hammered it into left field, pulling in a two-RBI single to tie up the game.
A quick top half of the sixth inning yielded no additional runs for the Pirates, but the bottom half of the inning suddenly had a much different feeling.
Aiden Sutika started the inning strong, taking a full-count slider past the infield to get a runner on base. A wild pitch to pinch-hitter Logan Kunkle moved him to second, and then the big hit of the game shifted momentum at that instant. Facing a 1-2 count, Kunkle connected on a liner up the third-base line, which moved Sutika into scoring position on third. Chris Fegert loaded the bases when the first pitch to him instead connected to the body, giving Thad Butler the perfect opportunity to give the Tide the lead.
Relief pitcher Dylan Hartman put two strikes against him, but on a 1-2 fastball, he swung the bat and connected to the gap between second and third, which pushed Kunkle and Sutika around the bases and the Tide into the lead.
“Logan coming in and getting a great bunt down, that was huge,” Graham said. “Then Aiden having such timely hits. I think that certainly shifted momentum.”
Mullins added the third run when he reached first during a tag out at second, making it 5-2 heading into the final inning. After the inning ended, Curwensville’s coaches decided to give Mullins a break, and made some lineup changes. Shane Sunderlin moved to the hill, while Mullins moved to shortstop, Butler shifted over to third, Josh Shaffer took over at first, and Sutika was taken out of the lineup for relief.
In the end, Sunderlin’s inning of work could not have gone better. A quick put out of Alex Brantner, followed by a similar outing of McGregor. With two outs up, Colten Wagner came up as the last hope for the visitors. But, Sunderlin shut down the opportunity, striking him out to hand Curwensville the first win of the season.
Mullins earned the win with his six innings of work, striking out seven and walking three, with Sunderlin earning the save on the afternoon. Hartman got tagged with the loss, giving up the final three runs in his single inning of work.
Graham was happy to see the team get the victory, especially since everyone seemed to be frustrated not knowing what they had, or what to improve upon.
“What’s crazy is we just had this conversation the other day with the team. We were frustrated because we didn’t know where we needed to work. We needed to play a game so we actually had some coaching points,” he said. “We got that now because we made a few mistakes, which we expected we would. We will coach them up, and hopefully we can put a ‘W’ on Bellwood. They are a strong team and we need to be ready.”
Bellwood-Antis is traveling to Curwensville (1-0) on Thursday afternoon, with a first pitch set for 4:30 p.m.
SCORE BY INNING
Williamsburg 200 000 0 – 2 3 2
Curwensville 000 023 X – 5 7 1
Williamsburg – 2
Caymen Hughes-CF 1100, Rowan Gorsuch-2B/SS 3110, Lambert Palmer-SS/P/1B 2010, Dylan Hartman-1B/P 3000, Dylan Shawver-3B 2001, Luke Uplinger-C 2001, Alex Brantner-LF 2010, Lambert Palmer-PH 1000, Liam McGregor-P/2B 2000, Colten Wagner-DH 3000. TOTALS 21 2 3 2.
Curwensville – 5
Thad Butler-SS/3B 3012, Tyler Lee-2B 3110, Jake Mullins-P/SS 2001, Shane Sunderlin-1B/P 4000, Spencer Hoover-C 3012, Jayson Rowles-RF 3000, Ayden Sutika-3B 3020, Grant Swanson-CR 0000, Nik Fegert-CR 0100, Tyler Libby-LF 2000, Logan Kunkle-PH 1110, Chris Fegert-CF 2210. TOTALS 26 5 7 5.
- LOB: 4/9
- SAC: McGregor, Uplinger/Butler
- FC: Gorsuch/Mullins, Sunderlin, Libby
- HBP: Shawver, C. Fegert
- SB: Hughes/Hoover, C. Fegert, Butler, Mullins, Libby
- CS: Brantner
- PIK: Gorsuch
- E: Brantner, Shawver/Mullins
- ROE: Uplinger/Butler, Sutika
PITCHING
Williamsburg: McGregor-4.1 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 SO, 3 BB; Palmer-0.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 SO, 1 BB; Hartman-1 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 SO, 0 BB.
Curwensville: Mullins-6 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 7 SO, 3 BB; Sunderlin-1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 SO, 0 BB.
W-Mullins
L-Hartman
SV-Sunderlin