‘It wasn’t our day.’ Bellefonte baseball falls to Eastern York in PIAA Class 4A playoffs
Bellefonte baseball’s season came to an end Monday evening in the first round of the PIAA Class 4A playoffs with a 14-1 loss to the Eastern York Golden Knights in five innings.
Seth Shuey took the mound for Bellefonte and was given a lead by his offense, but some timely hitting by the Golden Knights marred his day on the mound. They were able to string together hits and walks — along with two Bellefonte miscues in the field mixed in — to score their 14 runs.
“We didn’t have all facets of our game,” Bellefonte head coach Jon Clark said. “It wasn’t our day. They hit the ball extremely well. It seemed like any place we had a guy not standing, they found a way to put bat on ball. When you’re not playing at your best, sometimes you can’t control those things. ... It stinks it’s the last game of the year but our guys fought until the end and kept battling.”
The Raiders took an early 1-0 lead with the help of a fielding miscue by the Golden Knights. Zach Swanger opened the inning by getting on base on an infield single. Swagner then moved to third on a single by Braedyn Kormanic.
He was plated shortly after when Triston Heckman hit a ground ball to third that went through the legs of Eastern York third baseman Jake Myers. The Raiders were unable to take further advantage of the miscue and stranded two runners in scoring position.
The Golden Knights quickly responded in the top of the third to take the lead. Evan Rishell led off the inning with a single and was quickly followed with singles by Austin Bausman and then Owen Shimmel, which scored Rishell to tie the game.
A Justin Ranker single after two failed bunt attempts loaded the bases and Eastern York was able to take advantage of the situation. Senior Nate Dandridge lined Shuey’s pitch into the right-centerfield gap to clear the bases and earn himself a double. A Drew Dellinger single into the gap allowed Dandridge to cross the plate and gave Eastern York the 5-1 lead in the middle of the third.
Bobby Marsh’s ground-rule double in the bottom of the third gave the Raiders a runner in scoring position but they were unable to capitalize and respond to the Golden Knights.
Eastern York utilized two singles and a walk to load the bases for Dandridge again, this time in the top of the fourth. Derek Fravel, who relieved Shuey two batters into the inning, was unable to find the plate against the senior and walked him to score a run for Eastern York. He followed that with a walk of Brody Hinkle to make it a 7-1 game.
Dellinger then hit a grounder to shortstop but a throwing error by Heckman allowed two more runners to score and made it a 9-1 game.
Bellefonte was unable to answer once again in the bottom of the inning and Eastern York continued to pile on in the fifth. The Golden Knights loaded the bases with by reaching on an error then drawing two walks. They scored another run on a Fravel wild pitch, then scored the other two runs on a Ranker triple to deep right-centerfield to make it 12-1.
A wild pitch by Gavin Fravel, who relieved Derek after two walks, scored another run for the Golden Knights, and a single into right field by Simon Lipsius earned another run and made it 14-1.
That proved to be enough as Eastern York closed out the victory by the same score in five innings.
The loss brought the team’s season to an end, but Clark said he was especially proud of the group given what they had to play through this season.
“They battled throughout the year,” he said. “They battled and had success at the same time doing it. The school year that they had to deal with, dealing with COVID and masks, and all of the little things you had to do within school you had to come out here and show up and play ball and work hard every day, I couldn’t be more proud of a group of gentlemen. ... They’ve just worked hard. I appreciate the competitiveness, their attention to detail in practice and their willingness to work to try to get better in some difficult situations we faced.”
The loss drops Bellefonte’s record to 12-8 to close out the season.
This story was originally published June 7, 2021 at 7:37 PM.
