Published: May 23, 2008 12:04 am      

Rams’ gamble fails, season ends

WINGATE — Desperate times call for desperate measures, and this was certainly a desperate time at Doc Etters Memorial Field for the Richland baseball team.

Defending PIAA Class AA champion Bald Eagle Area was leading the Rams by three in the fourth inning of their District 6 Class AA semifinal game and the Eagles had Toby Quick on second base.

So Rams’ coach John Sidor decided to issue intentional two-out walks to leadoff hitter John Schall and Justin Koleno to load the bases, hoping for an out at any base.

“We were trying to coax a groundball,” Sidor said. “We’d be heroes if it worked, goats if it didn’t. We went with the percentages. That’s baseball. They had the meat of their order coming up and if it worked, hats off to us. But we had to try something.”

The gamble blew up in the Rams’ faces as Joe Pillot’s bad-hop single past third base drove in Quick and Schall, and A.J. Robinson singled home Koleno.

A walk to Derek Noll loaded the bases and Tyler Womer unloaded them with a homer to right-center for the final runs in an 11-1, five-inning win for the Eagles.

“We came here prepared to win but we weren’t prepared to end that inning,” Sidor said. “It just snowballed. Hats off to them. They hit the pitches they wanted to hit.”

The Eagles raked starter Bob Carbaugh for 10 of their 11 hits and all of their runs as they advanced to the District 6 title game for the third straight year. Schall, Pillot, Robinson and Miles Etters had two hits apiece in the Bald Eagle assault.

“We’re starting to hit here at the end of the season,” Womer said. “I hope we keep it up. Sometimes it takes us an inning or two to get on a pitcher but once we get a hit or two it doesn’t stop.”

The offensive display was exactly what coach Jim Gardner had been hoping to see from his predominantly underclass team.

“After our last game (an 11-2 win over Laurel Valley), I told them we had to get aggressive,” he said. “We have to hit from one through nine. Whatever I’ve asked these kids to do they’ve done. That was a decent pitcher (Thursday) and we were aggressive. The kids had a lot of fun out there. This is a young ballclub and they’re not near their potential yet, the way they hit the ball. We saw that. Their pitcher was around the plate and that allowed us to get ready to hit.”

Each team had a threat in the first inning but Robinson struck out the side around an error, a walk and an infield hit that loaded the bases. At the same time, Bald Eagle left Schall stranded at third thanks to an inning-ending double play.

Richland stranded another runner at third in the second before breaking through with a run in the third thanks to James Novotny’s RBI single that drove in Russ Gray. But with two on and two out, Robinson got Austin Urban to fly out to center to end the inning.

A single by Tyler Lucas, a sacrifice by Quick and a single by Schall in the bottom of the third tied the score before the fourth-inning eruption – which began with singles by Robinson and Noll, an error on a double-play ball, a single by Etters and a bloop double to center by Quick, which led Sidor to make his ill-fated move.

“We thought we could get to Blair County (Ballpark) but now we’ll have to wait until next year,” Sidor said.

Robinson, who was one of three returning starters from a year ago, allowed only three hits and struck out 10 to get the win.

He struck out five of the last six batters he faced, including all three in the fifth.

“Our hitting bulks up our confidence and right now our confidence level is pretty high,” he said.