Baseball: Chemics improve to 19-4 with Western sweep

by Michael O'Brien

The Midland High varsity baseball team added two more victories to its resume Thursday, winning game one of a doubleheader against Bay City Western 8-2 before taking the nightcap 4-1.

In game one, Midland High coach Eric Albright gave Andy Angus the start, and Angus would respond by pitching all seven innings and giving up just two runs, one earned, and eight hits. Despite recording no strikeouts, the senior kept the Warriors off the base paths, walking none and only allowing six runners to advance as far as second.

The first inning didn’t start well for Angus, though, as Tyler Rosenbrock and Nate Nowak led off with singles. After a fielder’s choice, Bay City Western attempted a double steal of second and home. But shortstop Thomas Ahearn would foil the attempt, receiving the throw from catcher Jeff Schaffert and firing the ball back to him just in time to nail the runner at the plate. However, the Warriors’ cleanup hitter and starting pitcher Josh Reder would later double, scoring K.C. Kleaver and putting the Chemics in a 1-0 hole.

But from the second inning on, Angus settled in and made quick work of the Warriors’ lineup. After a 14 pitch first inning, Angus posted six innings of 10 or fewer pitches and would finish with 45 of 65 pitches for strikes.

“He throws the ball over the plate,” Albright said. “He’s done that all season.”

On offense, the Chemics matched the Warriors’ first inning run when A.J. deOliveira drove Eric Dawson in with a single. After Angus gave up an unearned run in the third inning, Ahearn responded with a single in the bottom half of the inning. Ahearn would then steal second and take third and home on passed balls to tie the game at 2-2.

The offense would break out in the third inning when the Chemics scored four runs on three hits and an error. Schaffert drove in two in the inning, and Dawson added an RBI double to end the scoring in the fourth. Midland added two more in the fifth on another Schaffert RBI, and Schaffert would later score on an RBI single by Ahearn, who finished the game 3-for-3 and leads the team in hits.

“He’s been our ignitor,” Albright said of Ahearn.

After cruising to the 8-2 victory in game one, the Chemics found themselves in a pitcher’s duel in game two, led by the sparkling performance of Blake Benner.

Coming into the game, Benner had given up only three earned runs in his last 35 innings pitched. Despite the excellent numbers, he posted a 3-2 record during that span due to a lack of run support.

And run support was almost an issue again for Benner, who found himself in a tie game despite allowing only one run on six hits through six innings.

But the Chemics would finally break through when Josh Hahn started off the bottom of the sixth with a single. Ben Mercure followed with a sacrifice bunt down the first base line, moving Hahn to second and bringing Joel Parsons to the plate. Parsons would rip a high fastball down the left field line for a double, scoring Hahn easily. Ahearn kept things going with a single that scored Parsons, and Dawson pushed Ahearn across with an RBI double to left-center field.

“[Before the inning I was thinking] just give them one more chance,” Albright said. “Just give them one more chance. It was about time. We had had a lot of opportunities with runners on third earlier but didn’t score.”

The 4-1 lead was the run support Benner had been looking for in his previous starts as he shook off two seventh inning hits to get the win. Benner has now allowed only four earned runs in his last 42 innings pitched and has a 0.67 ERA in his last six appearances.

With two wins over the Warriors, the Chemics move to 19-4 overall and 13-3 in Saginaw Valley League play. The team will be in action this Saturday when it hosts the Midland Invitational. The invitational is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m.