Reversal of Fortune

CELINA - For a moment, it looked like St. Marys had tied the game in the top of the seventh to come all the way back from a 4-0 deficit. But it didn't last long.

An ill-timed timeout cost the Roughriders the tying run and Celina pitcher Quinn Andrew bore down, stranding two runners for a 4-3 win in a Western Buckeye League baseball game at Montgomery Field on Friday.

"Too big a hole from the beginning, giving them four," St. Marys coach Adam Graves said. "It's hard to play from behind. We fought 'til the end - honestly, I thought we tied the game up right there."

Trailing 4-2 in the top of the seventh, St. Marys (1-4, 0-2 WBL) finally brought the bats to bear. Joey Caldwell came up with one out and hit a bloop just over first base, just inside the line, for a single, and Trey Leatherman ripped a grounder up the middle to put the tying run on first.

Graves sent in Caleb Felver to run for Leatherman, and A.J. Dieringer lined a single into centerfield to score Caldwell from second before Andrew struck out pinch hitter Greg Felver for the second out.

After missing the zone on his first two pitches to Heath Dilsaver, Andrew whipped around to try to pick off Dieringer at first and missed badly. The ball caromed deep into foul territory in right field, and Caleb Felver raced around for the tying run as Dieringer steamed into third.

That was when the umpire held up his hands and signaled the runners back, ruling that Dilsaver had called timeout just before the throw.

"We're fortunate their batter called timeout, the umpire called timeout, right before we made that pickoff move, otherwise we'd be looking at a tie ballgame," Celina coach John Dorner said. "Sometimes you have to take advantage of those breaks, and we did."

Graves' appeal was denied, but the Roughriders still had two on with a 2-0 count. Andrew missed again before getting Dilsaver to look at strike one and foul off strike two, then got him to whiff on a pitch down in the zone for strike three to seal the victory.

Andrew pitched a complete game for the win, giving up five hits and a walk with 10 strikeouts on 94 pitches.

"Quinn Andrew pitched a phenomenal game for us tonight," Dorner said. "Their first two hits of the game, one barely went past first base on a ground ball, and the other was a bloop that hit about six inches inside the line. So he was pretty well dominating all game long."

St. Marys had no answer for Andrew through the first four innings, striking out seven times before putting a runner on base. Brayden Sullivan broke through at the start of the fifth, hitting a sharp ground ball that stayed just fair down the first base line.

Caldwell hit a double-play ball to short that was bobbled, and everyone reached safely. Leatherman bunted the runners over, Dieringer hit a fly ball to center that scored Sullivan and moved Caldwell to third, and Andrew's next pitch got past Carter Altstaetter as Caldwell dashed home to make it 4-2.

"We kind of figured out what he was going to do, and we started making adjustments which we had talked about early in the game," Graves said. "It took us a while to finally implement those adjustments."

But the Roughriders got going too late, and Celina (4-3, 1-1 WBL) had already built up an early lead against starter Ty Kiehl. Andrew led off the first with a double and scored when Feister singled to left two batters later to make it 1-0 in the first.

Kiehl got out of the inning with no further damage, but came apart in the second. Brady Steinbrunner took a pitch off the helmet to lead things off, Blayn Aller worked a full-count walk, and David Kramer laid down a bunt along the third base line that Kiehl couldn't reach in time as all three runners reached safely.

Kiehl struck out Zach Stein and got Andrew to fly out to shallow right, but couldn't quite escape the inning. Zach Greber hit a grounder up the middle to score Steinbrunner and Feister lined a shot into right-center to score two more.

"We were looking to hit early in the count," Dorner said. "We didn't wait around to hit a pitcher's pitch. We were very aggressive in the zone, and that's key. I thought as the game progressed, we started being a little bit too patient at the plate, and that's why we didn't hit the ball as well."

Graves called on Cole Koenig to stop the bleeding, and he struck out Carter Altstaetter to end the second before pitching four scoreless innings, stranding four runners to give St. Marys a chance to battle back.

"It doesn't matter the situation we put him in, he's been able to eliminate the big inning and give us a chance to win," Graves said. "From a pitching standpoint and a defensive standpoint, all you can ask is that they're giving us an opportunity to stay in the game. We just got to figure out how to score more runs."

With the win, Celina snapped a three-game losing streak.

Both teams cancelled their scheduled doubleheaders today, so they return to action Monday with Celina traveling to Versailles while St. Marys returns home to face St. Henry.