By SPENCER BATES
OLEAN — The Auburn Doubledays had pushed the Olean Oilers to the brink of a mercy rule defeat.
After a quiet first three frames, Auburn jumped on Olean’s pitching crew and had an early ending just two runs away in the seventh inning.
And while the Oilers did eventually succumb to their visitors, they did not go quietly — fighting with their backs against the wall and making their guests sweat out what ended up as a 10-7 result.
In the bottom of the ninth inning, Olean scored six runs — knocking out Auburn’s pitcher that had relieved starter William Baker III, who had thrown 8.0 stellar innings. What had the Oilers, and the fans that had stuck around, believing was that, of those six runs, four came before there was an out recorded by Auburn.
“When (the players) came into town, I told them we’re gonna give people opportunities to play, and I know you’re here to work, to get better for your college, but from my standpoint as coach and being an Olean guy, I need you to try to win for the city,” Olean head coach Mike Threehouse said. “They did that. They went nine innings, they tried to win the game when they were way down. It showed a lot of heart, and it shows that they’re obviously here to win, not just to get better and go off to their college in a couple months. It was good to see.”
But the late effort was more than just a product of the approach by those at the plate. Threehouse credited the rest of his team, who were causing a ruckus while willing their teammates on.
“They’ve been close since day one, and what’s great about it is they make adjustments even when new people come into the team,” Threehouse said. “They’re close as a team. They go fishing together, they do all kinds of stuff. So, it’s good to see them stay together as a team on and off the field.”
Through the first eight innings of the first meeting of the season between the Doubledays and Oilers, the hosts had managed just two hits. However, that does not mean they were failing to put the bat to the ball as the amount of fly-outs that Olean recorded reached double digits.
In the eyes of Threehouse, that significant number of flyouts is a result of going to the plate with the mentality of wanting to hit a home run. He noted that his players can’t have the idea of leaving the yard on their mind while at the plate, the focus has to be simply putting the ball in play.
“We hit 13 fly balls in that game. Some of them came just short of the fence, but there’s times when you can’t be swinging for a fence. You gotta be swinging for an RBI,” Threehouse said. “Whether it’s a line drive or a ground ball. That’s how we got beat today. (Auburn) only flew out three times. That team hit a lot of balls all around the park. From our standpoint as a team, we have to make adjustments.”
What didn’t necessarily help the Oilers’ cause through the first eight innings was that, after starting pitcher Brendan Roche held Auburn hitless through the first three innings, the bats of the visitors caught fire. They knocked Roche out of the game after the fifth, did the same to Bryson Huwar, and even did some damage off Austin Miles who closed out the game. When all was said and done, the Doubledays notched 14 hits.
Olean’s Brendan Roche (27) delivers a pitch against Auburn. Roche struck out five batters in five innings of work for the Oilers in their loss to the Doubledays. (Spencer Bates)
But, in spite of the high hit tally of his team’s opposition, Threehouse did not throw blame onto his pitchers. He praised Roche and Miles for their efforts and noted that Huwar has done a lot of good things for the team so far this season — today was just not his day.
“Roche threw well, he threw extremely well. And Huwar’s had great innings for us so he’s probably due for a bad one once in a while,” Threehouse joked. “But that’s baseball, right? That’s why you have an ERA. Sometimes you’re really good, sometimes not. So I’m not worried about him. He’s gonna do well. … It was great to see Austin throw. Austin came in and gave us some quality innings, and was very, very aggressive in his pitching, which we like.”
What offense Olean did manage on the night mostly came courtesy of the middle of the batting order as Denny Martin (1-for-2, run 2 RBI), Brady Smith (1-for-2, 2 runs), Cooper Tarlie (1-for-3, run, RBI) and Connor O’Mara (1-for-3, run) accounted for four of their team’s five total hits.
Olean will look to get back in the win column next on June 20 when they take on the Elmira Pioneers on the road at 6:30 p.m.
AT OLEAN
Auburn 000 203 410 R:10 H:14 E:0
Olean 001 000 006 R:7 H:5 E:3
AUB: Baker III (7 SO, 6 BB), Rocha (0 SO, 2 BB), Hauptfleisch (2 SO, 1 BB) and Taveras
OL: Roche (5 SO, 1 BB), Huwar (1 SO, 2 BB), Miles (3 SO, 1 BB) and Smith
Discover more from Olean Star
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
