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Maynard stays alive in OVBL

MAYNARD — With its back to the wall, Maynard took advantage of two bad hops in evening its Ohio Valley Baseball League semifinal playoff series with visiting Wheeling Wednesday night on the Firemen’s Field diamond.

The hosts (14-8) scored three times in the second and added a fourth tally in the third in rallying from an early 1-0 deficit en route to a gut-check, 4-3, triumph in Game 2 over the second-seeded Cardinals (17-5), who are the two-time defending champions having defeated Maynard both times. The third-and-deciding game is set for Friday night back in Maynard, with the Cardinals serving as the home team as their home field — Patterson Field — is the host diamond for the Beast of the East. The first pitch is scheduled for approximately 6.

“We live to play another day,” No. 3 seed Maynard manager Laney Simone Sr. said. “We came back here tonight and did what we had to to force a third game. We’ve got a good team. We played good baseball today. We cutdown on our mistakes, but we still left too many men on base. You can’t do that against a good team like Wheeling. We found that out the hard way in Game 1.”

Wheeling, which won 3-0 Game 1 on Aaron Henry’s three-run homer in the bottom of the sixth, grabbed a 1-0 lead in its first at-bat. Leadoff hitter Jim Earp reached on an error and scored on a groundout.

Maynard used some two-out lightning in the second to take the lead for good. Max Schimmel singled and Ryan Jarvie reached on an error. Eric Banal walked to load the bases before Dylan Busby singled to right that scored Schimmel and Jarvie. D.J. Busby’s ensuing base hit knocked in Banal to make it 3-1.

Dustin Hynes belted a one-out double in the third and came around on Mackenzie Koehler’s single over shortstop to increase the lead to 4-1. That, however, would turn out to be the game-winning run as the Cardinals rallied in the sixth.

Earp reached on an error leading off and scored on Todd Schmidt’s single. Henry followed with a base hit before Anthony San Felippo went the opposite way to right for a run-producing single, making it 4-3. Ricky Szeligo sent a flyball to right that Dylan Busby gloved and sent a rocket to the plate as Henry tried to score. The throw to Hynes was perfect as Henry was tagged out to complete the double play. Chris McIntire then walked Jon Nagel to put runners on the corners.

Simone had seen enough and summoned veteran Mark Cisar from the bullpen. Cisar was the loser in Game 1, but only threw 53 pitches. The righthander came in and induced Kyle Filtz to pop out to Schimmel in foul territory along the third base line.

Cisar then earned a slight measure of revenge when he fanned the side in the seventh, earning the save. He needed just 21 pitches to get the job done and is a likely candidate to toe the rubber Friday night with the season once again on the line. McIntire picked up the win. He struck out four, walked one and yielded four hits.

Maynard managed eight hits as Hynes singled and doubled to lead the way. Koehler and Dylan Busby evenly divided four singles.

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