By SPENCER BATES
PORTVILLE — After having dropped each of its last three games, the Portville baseball team bounced back with an 11-1, six-inning victory over Cattaraugus-Little Valley on April 21.
The Panthers got strong performances from numerous players throughout the batting order and, defensively, they leaned on the strong arm of starting pitcher Dylan Wenke.
“I’m glad to get back in the win column,” Portville head coach Joe Pleakis said. “A lot of kids got involved. It was a team effort. We needed it.”
It took time for the Portville offense to fully find its legs in the affair, and early on Wenke was the star of the show.
For it being his first start of the season, he did not waver. He struck out three of the first four batters he faced, with one only reaching base on a throwing error.
Wenke eventually racked up nine strikeouts on the day and gave up just one hit in a full-game outing.
“He’s been really good for us coming in for relief, so we gave him the start,” Pleakis said. “He was dominant. It was great to see him like that and we left him in to finish it. It was good to see him get his toes wet in varsity. Good to see him go start to finish for us.”
A grand majority of the game’s early scoring came on the back of defensive miscues. Portville’s first two runs came on the back of errors. CLV scored its lone run of the afternoon in the third, which knotted up the scores at 1-1, following an error from the hosts as well.
Taking advantage of struggles on the mound from the Timberwolves, the Panthers started to separate themselves with four runs, in the fourth — two of which came via hit batters with the bases loaded, and another came via an error.
The first error-free, non-sacrifice, non-walked-in score did not come until the bottom of the sixth inning when Portville’s Peyton Carter (1-for-4, 2 runs, 2 RBI) singled to center field. His teammate Parker Keim (3-for-5, 2 runs, RBI) batted in the game-winner in the very next at-bat.
“There were times it felt like we were really ready to put the hammer down, but we didn’t,” Pleakis said. “Parker Keim came out for us, laced one up the middle, and just manufactured his own run, made his way around the bases.”
Portville’s Dylan Chudy (1) connects for a hit against Cattaraugus-Little Valley. Chudy went 1-for-2 with a run for the Panthers in their win over the Timberwolves. (Spencer Bates)
While Pleakis was happy with the victory, the game could have been over even earlier than it was as the Panthers left nine runners on the basepaths through six frames. Part of that was due to decision-making, both on the basepaths and at the plate, but Pleakis is confident that those wrinkles will be easy to iron out on the back of a victory.
“There’s a lot of things we can clean up, which is easier to do after a win,” Pleakis said. “But I’m fully confident we can clean those things up and hopefully come out a little faster in the future.”
Defensively, Pleakis would like to see some adjustments made as well as his team did tally four errors. However, he attributed some of that to the fact he had some players out of position, trying to get them some rest.
“There’s things to work on,” Pleakis said. “We had some guys shift around trying to manage some arms. We got some sore arms, so we’re just kind of trying to rotate guys and give them a rest. (Keim), he doesn’t play third, but he played third for us today, so it was a different look for him over there. Nothing I’m really concerned with.”
Portville will look to make it two wins in two days against CLV as it makes the trek to face the Timberwolves at their place on April 22 at 5 p.m.
AT PORTVILLE
Catt.-Little Valley 001 000 X R:1 H:1 E:5
Portville 102 404 X R:11 H:8 E:4
CLV: Ulinger (1 SO, 1 BB), Hill (1 SO, 4 BB), Wade (3 SO, 1 BB), Bradley (0 SO, 0 BB) and Gassman
Port: Wenke (9 SO, 5 BB) and Chudy
