UNION CITY – The Ansonia Tigers varsity boys baseball team defeated the Mississinawa Valley Blackhawks 13-5 in Thursday night WOAC play.
“We came out with energy, the dugout was rocking, and we put the bats on the ball,” said Ansonia coach Dustin Hecht. “They battled pedal to the metal in the first three innings. We were making great contact and moving people.”
“We had a couple of mistakes, but we’re not playing bad baseball right now,” said Mississinawa Valley coach Kyler Guillozet. “Nobody gives up, and that’s what I like a lot about this team.”
The Tigers jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the top of the first inning of play with the big hits, a two-run double off the bat of Lander Shives and a Darby Gilland RBI double.
The Hawks battled back in the bottom of the inning with a Cole McGlothlin leadoff double, a Kyle Wehrkam RBI single, and a Seth Kiser run-scoring single, sending the game to inning No. 2 with Ansonia up 3-2.
“Ansonia hit the ball very well,” said Mississinawa Valley coach Kyler Guillozet. “We threw our No. 1 and No. 2 guy, and they hit the ball, they tattooed the ball.”
Ansonia exploded for six second-inning runs with a Noah Heck double, a Jacob MacNutt single, a Cainan Robinson walk, a bases-loaded walk to Kam Ingle, followed by a Shives two-run single. Gilland capped the six-run inning with a towering three-run homer deep over the left field fence for a 9-2 Tigers’ lead.
“His bat has been really hot,” Coach Hecht said of Gilland’s home run. “He’s just hitting the ball really well right now.”
The Tigers made it an 11-2 game in the top of the third, getting MacNutt and Ingle walks, an Asher Shives single, a Lander Shives hit by a pitch, and a bases-loaded run-scoring walk to Gilland.
The game played out over the remainder of the game with the Hawks scoring single runs in the third, fourth, and seventh innings while Ansonia was tacking on single runs in the top of the fifth and seventh innings.
“We’ve been preaching to them; you have to come out hot and stay on it at all times,” Hecht stated. “We’re starting to move in the right direction, we’re making good progress. I like where we’re at, we just need to complete full games.”
“Ansonia hit the ball very well,” said Mississinawa Valley coach Kyler Guillozet. “We threw our No. 1 and No. 2 guy, and they hit the ball, they tattooed the ball.”
Cainan Robinson went the distance on the mound for Ansonia, allowing four earned runs on eight hits, two walks, and striking out four.
Gilland paced Ansonia at the plate, going 3-4 with a home run, two doubles, and a walk, six RBIs, and two runs. Archer Shives went 4-5 with three RBIs and three runs scored. Noah Heck was 2-5 with a double, and a run; Kam Ingle 1-3, 2 walks, one RBI, three runs; Lander Shives 1-3, a walk, two RBIs, one run; Austin Singer 1-5, one RBI; MacNutt 1-3, a walk, two runs.
Wehrkamp led MV going 2-4, including a double, an RBI, and two runs. McGlothlin, Seth Kiser, Elliott Seubert, Caleb Spradling, Wyatt Stump, and Leland Kauffman each contributed a hit for the Hawks.
BOX SCORE:
123 456 7 R H E
362 010 1 13 13 4 Ansonia
201 100 1 5 8 2 Mississinawa Valley
