With a lineup relying heavily on underclassmen, it would be fair to expect some bumps in the road for the Oneonta baseball team early in the season.
It certainly looked that way at the beginning of Thursday’s home opener against Windsor when the Yellowjackets fell behind 8-1 in the third inning.
But coach Joe Hughes’ young squad showed resilience beyond their years to rally for an 11-9 victory that kept their perfect record alive at 4-0.
“Comeback wins are a lot of fun,” Hughes said. “When we were down 8-1 early I told them, ‘The bad part is we’re down 8-1, but it’s early.’ I like the way our team’s been swinging the bats. We put together really good at-bats. They battled, never gave up and we believed we were going to win and we were able to pull it out.”
Oneonta used a pair of big innings — five in the third and four in the sixth — to claw back and held on when Windsor threatened to retake the lead in the top of the seventh.
Nolan Stark reached base every time at bat, leading the offense with two triples, two walks and four runs scored.
Chase Jervis added a triple, a double and two RBI while Brady Carr, Jameson Brown and Bruce Mistler each had big RBI hits in the sixth.
“I just thought we had some really good at-bats,” Hughes said. “Chase Jervis, our eighth grader, had a double and a triple. Nolan’s seeing the ball well. Brady Carr’s been swinging the bat well. Jameson Brown had a key hit. Our lineup is pretty solid. I think the more games we play on a regular basis, the more it’s going to improve.”
Each team scored a run in the first inning before Windsor went up 4-1 in the second thanks to RBI base knocks from Tyson Schmitt and Ashton Werner.
The Black Knights increased their lead to 8-1 in the third by converting on some Oneonta miscues, with Schmitt’s two-run single representing the big blow.
OHS kept its composure despite the large deficit and got to work in the bottom of the third.
After loading the bases thanks to two walks and a hit by pitch, Stark scored on a fielder’s choice that broke up a potential double play to keep the inning alive.
From there, Maddox Imperato and Grayson Brockington drove in a run apiece and Jervis came up big with a two-run double to cut the lead to 8-6.
Imperato helped settle things down on the mound for Oneonta when he came in in relief of Carr in the third inning, working through the sixth and allowing just three hits and no walks.
Stark scored on a passed ball in the fourth to trim the deficit further but Windsor responded in the fifth with an RBI triple by Kohen Werner that made it 9-7.
After a scoreless bottom of the fifth, Stark got Oneonta started in the sixth with a leadoff walk. This kicked off a string of three straight run-scoring hits by Carr, Brown and Mistler, who gave OHS its first lead of the game with a two-run single.
Britten Zeh then got the call from the bullpen to close things out. After striking out the leadoff man, Windsor recorded back-to-back singles to put runners on first and third.
But Brockington recorded the second out with a great catch in left field to keep both runners in place and Zeh finished things off with a strikeout for out number three.
It was the type of victory that Hughes believes can have an impact throughout the rest of the season.
“Comeback wins give you a lot of confidence, a lot of belief in what coaches tell kids all the time: keep playing, when you’re down don’t give up, all those things,” he said. “You hear it all the time and it’s true, you can come back. So the next time they’re down, they’ll believe in themselves, they’ll believe it’s a seven-inning game and battle right to the end.”
While it hasn’t always been perfect through the first two weeks of the season, Oneonta left the field Thursday with a zero still sitting in the loss column.
“One of the kids told me, ‘It’s your formula: pitching, defense and timely hitting.’ I said, ‘They weren’t all so great today,’” Hughes said with a laugh. “But we made some plays when we had to and certainly had some timely hitting today. Hitting carried the day today and tomorrow, we’ll see what happens.”
Oneonta 11, Windsor 9
Windsor 134 010 0 — 9 13 1
Oneonta 105 104 X — 11 8 3
Win: Nico Soriano, Ryan Kristof (L, 4) and Kohen Werner
OHS: Brady Carr, Maddox Imperato (W, 3), Britten Zeh (S, 7) and Jameson Brown
3B: Nolan Stark 2 (OHS), Chase Jervis (OHS), Kohen Werner (W)
2B: Brady Carr (OHS), Chase Jervis (OHS), Tyson Schmitt (W), Nico Soriano (W)