CONNEAUT —
Tyler Cox just may have been exactly what Conneaut American Legion Post 151 needed in a District 9 tournament game Wednesday night at Skippon Park.
Cox entered the game with Conneaut trailing, 8-6, when it was over, Post 151 had a 13-9 victory.
“Our pitching came through for us when we brought Tyler Cox into the game in the fourth,” Conneaut manager Jim Tupa said. “We have quite a few kids who run well, so we give them the green light if they think they can make it.”
With both teams playing sloppy ball over the first four innings, Cox slowed the Jefferson bats down a lot. Conneaut tallied 10 runs over the first four frames via eight hits and six Jefferson errors. All 10 runs were charged to Jefferson starter Troy Bloom and all 10 were unearned.
Conneaut then took advantage of four more errors to score three in the bottom of the eight inning to expand the lead.
Jake Simek pitched the ninth for Conneaut and gave up consecutive doubles to Brett Powers and Ryan Zindash for the last run of the game, but a strikeout and pair of ground balls put the game on ice.
Coupled with 10 Conneaut hits, the 10 errors, seven walks, and seven stolen bases, and the whole mess was too much for Jefferson to respond to.
Jereme Smith had three hits and scored three times, Frank Clayman reached on five of six at bats, with two hits, two runs, and two runs batted in. Jarred Walker reached four times while scoring three runs, Simek also reached four times, and Austin DiBell had a pair of hits to drive home three.
Jefferson also hit the ball well, outhitting the winners 13-10 and drew six walks. Conneaut only made three errors, with two coming in a three-run fourth that temporarily gave Jefferson an 8-6 lead.
That disappeared quickly when Smith singled with one out in the fourth, Walker reached on an infield error putting runners at the corners, and the duo executed a delayed double steal to perfection for one run. DiBell singled home the second run of the frame, Tyler Cox walked and Clayman singled to center for the last two runs that gave Conneaut a lead they maintained.
“We now head to the loser's bracket,” Jefferson coach Kerry Freeman said. “We are supposed to take on Mentor at home tomorrow. We just booted the ball around tonight, that's all there is to it. We can beat Mentor. We lost to them in extra innings a few days ago, but we think we can beat them, but we won't if we don't catch the ball better.”
Hitting just might be the key for Post 151 going forward.
“We're a decent hitting team,” Tupa said. “Now we prepare for Strongsville tomorrow on their field. They are the No. 1 seed, we're number two, and the winner advances on to play again at Edgewood this Saturday.”
Kelly is a freelance writer from Jefferson.
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