STEUBENVILLE–After taking one on the chin a day earlier, Steubenville’s baseball team bounced back Wednesday, earning a 5-2 victory over Harrison Central at Vaccaro Field.

“We had a rough one yesterday (Big Red fell to Indian Valley),” Steubenville coach Fred Heatherington said. “I’m not sure the sun came up today but we played. That’s the best thing about baseball–you don’t have time to worry about what you did the day before. You have to focus on getting ready for the next day.

“Today, we were ready to play. We had a rough day and a good night. People might not understand that, but we had a good night. We pulled out the old PMA today.”

Cooper Blackburn was the main cog in the rebound, which helped Steubenville improve to 10-5 on the season. The sophomore turned in a stellar performance on the mound and helped his own cause by driving home two runs.

The right-hander held the Huskies hitless through five innings. Blackburn walked Kobe Mitchell to start the Harrison Central second but then retired the next 13 hitters he face. Jonathan Vermillion broke up the no-hitter with a one-out single in the sixth.

Skylar Mazeroski followed with a base hit. They both scored on Treston Nemeth’s booming double to left. The Harrison rally ended when Andrew Gresko made a nice running grab of Mitchell’s fly to right.

Blackburn allowed just three hits and fanned four in going the route.

“Cooper was in control of the strike zone the whole game,” Heatherington said. “He battled and he stayed within himself. That is the key for him–staying within himself.

“Team wise, we really got after it today. Going forward, we had to continue getting after it.”

Harrison Central starter Caleb Blawut recorded a 1-2-3 inning in the first. The third out came via a diving grab in left by Kaden Jurusko. Kye Fleming started Steubenville’s second with a base hit and J.T. Thompson added another. Aaron Ferguson drew a walk to load the sacks.

Fleming scored on Zach Smith’s fly to right and Thompson scampered home on a Blackburn grounder to short.

Steubenville took advantage of a Huskie error to make it 3-0 in the fourth. Blackburn’s single accounted for the fourth tally. Gresko delivered a RBI in the sixth.

Blawut scattered six hits. The loss dropped the Huskies to 6-10.

“I don’t think he threw badly,” Harrison Central coach said Mike Valesko said of Blawut’s performance. We had a double play ball to get us out of an inning and we threw it away. On the batter before that, we didn’t make a play on a fly ball to left. Against a program and team like Steubenville Big Red, you have to do better. When you are not hitting the ball, you almost have to field it perfectly.

“We did not have very good at bats today. We only had three hits and we had a lot of weakly hit stuff. We didn’t make them field a ton of stuff. We had a lot of foul balls in foul territory that went 20 or 30 feet. Outside of two or three at bats, we just didn’t hit anything solid. We have to keep working and continue to improve in that area.”

Up next:

Harrison Central: Tentatively visits Bellaire Friday.

Steubenville: Still has an outside shot of making the OVAC Class 5A playoffs. If not, Heatherington’s club will be idle until it entertains Catholic Central Tuesday. The first pitch is set for 7 p.m.