Mistakes break PT in extra-inning title game
Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
Drew Ripepi, Tucker Ferris (5), Sam Miller (9) and Jack Kail (7) hang their heads in disappointment after losing their bid for a WPIAL Class 5A championship. Peters Township dropped a 5-4 decision to West Allegheny in extra innings.
By Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
While West Allegheny coaches celebrate their 5-4 victory over Petes Township in the WPIAL Class 5A championship game, Tucker Ferris agonizes on the ground.
By Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
Wes Parker jumps for joy and congratulates Drew Ripepi as he scores the tying run for Peters Township and pushed the WPIAL Class 5A championship game into extra innings.
Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
Tucker Ferris celebrates after getting out of the seventh inning with three straight putouts during the WPIAL Class 5A championship game.
Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
Wes Parker slips back to the bag safely before Anthony Pass can apply the tag in the seventh inning of the WPIAL Class 5A championship game. Parker led off the frame with a single but Peters Township could not capitalize, moving the game with West Allegheny into extra innings.
Jack Kail (7) and Joey Bedillion (17) walk away from second base after an errant throw on a steal attempt ended up in centerfield. While Tucker Ferris retrieved the ball, West Allegheny scored two runs.
Jake Kail hauls in a pop out during WPIAL Class 5A baseball championship action.
West Allegheny's Joe Pustover slips safely back to bag before the throw reaches Peters Township's Wes Parker and umpire Todd Stephan prepares to make the call.
Peters Township first baseman Wes Parker makes a putout in the second inning of the WPIAL Class 5A championship game.
Peters Township starting pitcher Sam Miller brings the heat during WPIAL Class 5A championship action against West Allegheny.
Nico Melograne
Eleanor Bailey/The Almanac
Peters Township’s Nico Melograne (24) celebrates with Drew Ripeppi after both players scored runs in the third inning. The game was tied at 4-4 going into the seventh inning at presstime. For complete details, visit www.observer-reporter.com
Peters Township's Jack Kail makes contact during WPIAL Class 5A championship action. Kail tripled and scored a run in the first inning.
An old baseball adage is that walks and errors will kill you 99 times out of 100. You can include balks in that grouping, too.
And unfortunately for Peters Township, that one time when a team gets away with all of those self-inflicted wounds was not Wednesday night.
Peters Township fell victim to a pair of leadoff walks, a costly throwing error and an untimely balk in a 5-4 eight-inning loss to West Allegheny in the WPIAL Class 5A championship game at soggy Wild Things Park. The game was twice delayed because of rain and lightning.
West Allegheny (19-4) broke a 4-4 tie in the top of the eighth, getting a soft two-out single to shallow center field by Anthony Raineri that scored Brady Miller from second base. Miller had reached base on an infield single that hugged the third-base line and moved to second when PT relief pitcher Tucker Ferris, who was otherwise outstanding over 2 2/3 innings, was called for a balk.
“We made a couple of ill-advised plays that we don’t normally do, and good teams make you pay for those things,” explained PT head coach Rocky Plasio.
West Allegheny (19-4), which was the No. 3 seed, won its fifth WPIAL championship and first since 2008.
Top-seeded Peters Township (21-2), which had its 10-game winning streak snapped, battled back from an early 4-1 deficit and tied the score at 4-4 in the sixth inning, when Jack Kail laced his second triple of the game, a two-out shot to right centerfield on an 0-2 pitch by winning pitcher Nate Nolan. Kail’s hit scored Drew Ripepi, who had walked.
Peters Township never led, but West Allegheny’s largest lead after the third inning was only one run. In other words, it was the kind of game WA plays and wins.
“We’ve played 10 one-run games and we’ve won nine of them,” West Allegheny coach Bryan Cornell said. “The magic is these kids are at their best with runners in scoring position. We have to play small-ball at times. We won’t pound out 10 or 11 hits. We’ll pound out five or six, but they’ll be with runners in scoring position.”
West Allegheny struck early, scoring two runs in the top of the first inning against PT starter Sam Miller. Leadoff hitter Joseph Pustover fell behind in the count 0-2 but battled back and worked a walk. Designated hitter Gavin Miller followed with a run-scoring triple to the angle in right centerfield, giving West Allegheny a 1-0 lead two batters into the game.
Gavin Miller had been sidelined by an injury for almost the entire season. The triple came on his 11th at-bat of the season and was his first RBI.
One batter later, WA made it 2-0 when Colin Marinpetro hit a sacrifice fly to left field.
Peters Township responded with one run in the bottom of the first against WA starter Anthony Pass. Kail, the Indians’ No. 2 hitter, laced a triple up the gap in left centerfield and Sam Miller followed with an RBI double over the head of right fielder Marinpetro.
West Allegheny pushed the lead to 4-1 in the second, and again the frame started with a leadoff walk, this one to Raineri, who was bunted to second base. With two outs, Pustover singled to center field to score Raineri. When the throw from the outfield went past the cutoff man and to home plate, Pustover tried to advance to second base. The throw from PT catcher Jack Lutte to second base was high and sailed into the outfield and bounced over charging center fielder Ferris, allowing Pustover to come all the way around to score WA’s fourth run.
Peters Township closed to within 4-3 by scoring two runs in the third. With the bases loaded and one out, Bryce Thompson hit a chopper up the middle that WA shortstop Brady Miller made a fine play to snag by going far to his left behind the second-base bag. In attempt to get a forceout, Miller flipped the ball to second baseman Pustover, who wasn’t expecting the toss. Drew Ripepi scored from third on the infield hit, and when Miller’s errant toss rolled toward the pitcher’s mound, Sam Miller, who began the play on second base, was able to race home to cut the WA lead to a single run.
PT had a great chance to grab the lead after scoring the two runs but left the bases loaded in the third. The Indians stranded nine runners in the game and at least one in every inning expect the second.
“We can pick and choose on little things that were mistakes, and they capitalized on them, but we left too many men on base,” Plasio said. “We have to score more runs. One hit and the game swings the other way.”
After WA took the 5-4 lead, the Indians had another good chance to force a ninth inning. Jack Natili drew a leadoff walk in the bottom of the eighth and was bunted to second base by Nick Sampson. That brought up Ripepi and Kail, PT’s Nos. 1 and 2 hitters in the lineup.
“Jack had a great game and to have the tying run at second base with him up, we couldn’t ask for more than that,” Plasio said.
Nolan, who threw five innings of relief to get the win, was able to end the game by getting a flyout and groundout.
PT will open the state tournament Monday against the runner-up from District 3.
“This is really tough to deal with but we get another opportunity, so how long do you want to stay together?” Plasio said of his message to his team. “If you want to stay together longer, then you find a way to fight for each other and extend the season and work toward the next goal.”
The game was twice delayed because of lightning and then rain. It was stopped for 36 minutes in the top of the sixth inning, and again for 37 minutes between the seventh and eighth innings.
“It was tough. There’s no book on how you prepare for it,” Plasio said. “You just try to keep the kids focused and we had a good mindset. It just didn’t go our way.”