Hopwood strikes early, tops Mill Run 6-2
Local roundup
Hopwood Village Plaza rang up four runs in the first inning and rode that early advantage to a 6-2 victory over visiting Mill Run in Fayette County Baseball League action on Thursday.
Santino Marra came on in relief in the second inning and tossed six scoreless frames to earn the win and Jake Lee had two hits, including a double, and scored two runs for Hopwood (10-6).
Marra allowed three hits and four walks with one strikeout.
The Millers (2-14) took a 2-0 lead in the top of the first off Hopwood starting pitcher Robbie Andrews. Josh Burns hit a one-out single and scored on Hunter Smiley’s double. Cade Warrick brought in Smiley with a single.
Tate Musko relieved Andrews and followed a pair of walks with two strikeouts to avoid any further damage.
Chase Sankovich, Jared Hough and Chad Petrush each singled as Hopwood answered with four runs in the bottom of the inning to take the lead for good.
Marra came on in the second and issued two walks and a hit by pitch with one out but got out of the bases-loaded jam when third baseman Wyatt Nehls turned a ground ball into an inning-ending double play.
Warrick walked and Colby Simmons singled to start the third inning for Mill Run but Marra again escaped the jam by retiring the next three batters.
Hopwood tacked on a run in the fourth inning to make it 5-2 when Lee singled, took second on a wild pitch and scored on Erik Streussnig’s single.
Hopwood added one more insurance in the seventh when Lee doubled and eventually stole home.
Warrick reached base in all four of his plate appearances with two doubles, a single and a walk, accounting for half of the Millers’ hits.
Losing pitcher Lane Smiley surrendered all six runs on six hits and six walks with four strikeouts in 5 2/3 innings.
CHARLEROI 7, CARMICHAELS 6 — Charleroi was limited to six hits but made them count in pulling out a victory over visiting Carmichaels.
Four of those hits were consecutive singles by Tyler Sankovich, Colton Brightwell, Chad Behrendt and Remington Lessman following a one-out walk by Lorenzo Glasser in a three-run fifth inning that turned a 5-4 deficit into a 7-5 lead.
Lessman started on the mound for the Magicians (8-7-1) and surrendered one earned run on six hits in three innings. Winning pitcher Josiah Fisher followed and coughed up four runs in two innings before Kolten Smittle relieved him with the bases loaded and no outs in the sixth. Smittle allowed just an RBI ground out by Alex Vansickle that whittled the lead to one in finishing up the frame.
The Copperheads (12-3-1) loaded the bases again with two walks and a single by Liam Lohr in the top of the seventh before Smittle got a game-ending pop out to earn the save.
The Magicians trailed 2-0 when they parlayed three hit batters, a walk and a two-run double by Sankovich into a four-run outburst in the bottom of the second to take a 4-2 advantage.
The first-place Copperheads pulled even in the fourth inning on Vansickle’s two-run double then took a 5-4 lead when Dom Obiecunas drilled a solo home run in the top of the fifth.
Carmichaels went up 1-0 in the first inning on Noah Mildren’s home run and made it 2-0 in the second on Devin Fluhmann’s RBI single.
Sankovich had two hits, two RBIs and a run for Charleroi.
Flumann was 3 for 4 and Vansickle had three RBIs for the Copperheads, who also got a double and a single from Ben Shields and two hits from Obiecunas.
Losing pitcher Gianni Cantini, the third of four pitchers used by Carmichaels, surrendered three runs in 2 2/3 innings.