Hopewell Baseball
Hopewell HS Baseball Holds on For 13-12 Win Over Shenango
Hopewell Township- With a temperature of 42 degrees at first pitch, the Hopewell High School baseball team opened up their defense of the WPIAL 4A championship as they hosted Shenango at Joe Colella Field.
A manager always preaches to their players to win the inning and Hopewell certainly did that today which propelled them to a 13-12 win over Shenango.
Right-hander David Medich received the opening day assignment and certainly looked the part of an ace.
In the first inning, Medich led off the game by striking out the side. Two of the strikeouts came on called third strikes as David’s off-speed pitch was nasty today.
The Vikings hitters were aggressive swinging the bats and that paid off in the bottom of the first as they scored 7 runs on 6 hits.
Lucas Walton led off the game with an opposite field single to right field. Zach Gigliotti then laid down a perfect bunt up the third base line. Then with the bases loaded, cleanup hitter Ben McDonald hit a deep single to left field which scored Walton.
The second Hopewell run scored on a bases loaded walk to Charlie Smetana, which was followed by an RBI single by Tyler Triscila. The lead increased to 6-0 two batter later as Logan Triscila hit a perfectly placed double up the third base. The inning was capped off as Hopewell batted around and Walton got his second hit of the game as he hit a line drive RBI single to CF.
That bottom of the first inning was a long 35+ minute inning which meant Medich was forced to sit on the bench in the cold for a extended period.
Shenango’s first two batters reached base in the second inning but Medich came back to slam the door shut. With the bases loaded and 1 out, Shenango hit a grounder back to Medich, who threw home to Smetana for the force out.  Then with 2 outs and down 3-1 in the count, Medich threw two consecutive strikes , including an overpowering fastball to end the inning.
The Hopewell offense tacked on three more runs in the second inning on a 2-run single to left field by James Gill, scoring Aaron Dickhart and Kingston Krotec, who reached on an infield single.
Shenango threatened in the 3rd inning as runners reached with two outs but once again Medich got out of the inning with a strikeout.
Different inning nearly the same result in the 4th inning. Shenango recorded their first hit of the game and scored two runs to cut the lead to 10-2. They were threatening to score more as they had two on with two outs, but Medich ended the inning with a perfect curveball for a called third strike.
The Vikings scored but important insurance runs in the 5th inning. Sophomore Drew Donovan led off the inning with an opposite field single to right field. Next up, John Vescio clubbed a deep double to the gap in left-center to score Donovan. Later in the inning, Vescio would score on an infield single by Carter Kokoskie. Hopewell led 12-3 after five innings.
Hopewell appeared to be in clear control of the game, but things got dicey in the 6th inning as Shenango scored 9 runs to tie things up at 12. Shenango had a chance to take the lead in the 6th inning as they had runners at 2nd and 3rd and 2 outs, but Lucas Walton induced a strikeout.
Hopewell responded in the bottom of the 6th inning. The first three hitters, Gigliotti, Vescio and McDonald all walked to load the bases with no outs. Next up, Smetana hit it to the pitcher who misplayed the ball allowing Gigliotti to score, what proved to be the game-winning run.
Hopewell took the lead 13-12 and then the game was called due to darkness.
Hopewell starts the season 1-0 and will be in action tomorrow for another home game, this one against Mohawk. First pitch is scheduled for 4 PM.