Fifth inning proves costly for Indians

COLUMBUS - The first four innings of Friday's Division IV state baseball semifinal at Huntington Park was a game of "can you top this?"

Fort Recovery took the early lead only to see Newark Catholic tie it up and then take a lead. Fort Recovery then came back to tie the game at 3-3.

Newark Catholic, though, came up with the final comeback, scoring four runs in the top of the fifth, leading the Green Wave to a 7-3 win over the Indians.

Fort Recovery (22-10) had its season ended in the state final four by the Green Wave for the second straight year. Defending champion Newark Catholic (23-10) advances to tonight's title game against Triad. The Cardinals beat Cuyahoga Heights 6-0 in Friday's other semifinal.

"It's hard to get here. We're happy to be here, but we're going to be disappointed with this one," Fort Recovery coach Jerry Kaup said. "We're going to feel like we gave it away. I don't know how many earned runs they scored (three of the seven), but I'm going to guess it wasn't many."

After getting through the top of the first unscathed, Fort Recovery pitcher Nick Thwaits led off the bottom of the inning with a single. Cade Wendel bunted Thwaits to second. After Jackson Hobbs struck out, Jacob Homan doubled down the third base line to score Thwaits. Hunter Boughman followed with a single to score Homan for a 2-0 lead, a big boost after Newark Catholic had shut out Fort Recovery in last year's semifinal.

"We had two runs with two outs and were able to get on top of them," Kaup said. "That's important in a ballgame. But we gave it back."

The Green Wave, looking for their ninth state title and third in the past four years, tried to answer in the top of the second. Zac Walker reached on an error and went to second when the throw went into the Fort Recovery dugout. Nick Cavinee followed with a single. After Caleb Claggett bunted Cavinee to second, Tyler York grounded to short, but Jacob Homan threw home to Chase Bruns, who applied the tag to Walker for the second out. Jody Mummey ended the threat with a pop-out to Boughman in foul territory.

The Green Wave finally broke up the shutout in the third. Tanner Lake led off with an infield single, Mitch Lohr followed with a single and then Jon Erhard reached on an error to load the bases with no outs. Thwaits got the first out with a strikeout. Zac Walker grounded to Hobbs at third, who threw home to get the force out. Cavinee singled to left-center to score Lake and Lohr, tying the game. Claggett reached on a walk to load the bases for York. Thwaits then threw his second wild pitch of the inning to score Walker before striking out York to end the inning, but the Wave was up 3-2.

Fort Recovery squared up the game at 3-3 in the bottom of the third when Hobbs singled in Thwaits, but the Indians had two good chances to add runs fall short as Wendel was thrown out at third after a wild throw to second and Hobbs was thrown out at home trying to break the tie.

"On base hits into the outfield, we tried to run," Kaup said. "We tried to be a little more aggressive on the bases, and they caught us. That's my fault."

Thwaits rebounded in the fourth by striking out Wollenberg to leave Wave runners stranded at first and second. Fort Recovery chased Wave starting pitcher Tanner Marmie with two outs in the fourth after he allowed walks to Bruns and Will Homan. Cane Whitney came on to get Thwaits into a groundout to end the threat.

"He came in and threw a couple of balls early (and) then he settled down and got out of the jam," Kaup said of Whitney.

Newark Catholic started the fifth with back-to-back singles from Cavinee and Claggett. York stepped in and doubled to right to score pinch runner Noah Fodor to break the tie. Kaup called on Hobbs to try to end the threat, but Mummey laid down a perfect squeeze bunt to score Claggett to make it 5-3. A throwing error on Lake's grounder scored York and Mummey to make it 7-3 before the Indians finally got out of the inning.

"Doggone it. We just let it get away," Kaup said. "We made our pitchers throw too many pitches (Thwaits threw 80 in 4 1/3 innings) on a hot day and then we were booting the ball around. Even in the innings when (Newark Catholic) didn't score, it cost him a couple of pitches."

Whitney took over from there for the Green Wave, getting a 1-2-3 inning in the bottom of the fifth and then using a 6-3 double play to erase a throwing error when Reese Rogers pinch hit for Boughman.

In the seventh, Thwaits singled with one out and Wendel was hit by a pitch to put two on for Hobbs. Hobbs thought he had earned a walk on a 3-1 pitch that was called a strike. Whitney's next offering to Hobbs was hit out to right field for the second out. Jacob Homan lofted a deep fly to center, but Mummey tracked it down to end the game.

"We had a chance there at the end," Kaup said. "There was a pitch at 3-1 that Jackson thought was high. Then he swung at one that I think was out of the zone. That's a part of baseball with close calls one way or another. We had our opportunities. We just didn't get it done."

Thwaits went 3-for-4 and scored two of the Indians' runs.

The five Fort Recovery seniors playing their last game - Hobbs, Jacob Homan, Wendel, Ross Homan and Bruns - helped the team go 47-16 the past two seasons with two regional titles and two trips to Huntington Park.