Photo by Kim North St. Clairsville’s Roby Hanna delivers a pitch during the Red Devils’ Division V Region 19 Championship matchup with Lynchburg-Clay.

MARIETTA — It just wasn’t meant to be for the St. Clairsville baseball team on Thursday.

The Red Devils led Lynchburg-Clay 4-2 in the bottom of the sixth inning of their Ohio Division V Region 19 championship game, only to have one of the whackiest plays you’ll ever see allow the Mustangs to draw even without the ball being put into play.

Lynchburg-Clay (23-3) went on to defeat St. Clairsville, 5-4, in nine innings on the artificial surface at Don and Sue Schaly Field inside Pioneer Park at Marietta College.

“In 29 years I’ve never seen a play like that. It was very unfortunate,” veteran St. Clairsville head coach Tom Sliva assessed. “We did a lot of good things to get here, and we did a lot of good things today, but we just couldn’t pull it out.”

Sliva was talking about a play that will be remembered for a long time.

With Lynchburg-Clay runners on first and second and two out, the two Mustang runners broke on a 1-2 pitch. St. Clairsville catcher Micky Balgo’s throw to third deflected off the bat of the batter and caromed to the third base dugout. In the process, Red Devils third baseman Nico Jacob was knocked down by the runner who got up and raced home. The runner on first came all the way around to tie the game at 4 as St. Clairsville left fielder Elijah Hill had to retrieve the ball.

The Mustangs nearly won the game in the bottom of the seventh, but Jacob snagged a shot with a runner on third and threw the runner out at first from his knees to end the threat.

The Red Devils left a runner on in the eighth and ninth frames before winning pitcher Braedan West lifted a sacrifice fly to right with one out that scored Elam Faust with the winning run.

“Roby Hanna pitched one heckuva game for a sophomore,” Sliva said of his lefty. “We were where we wanted to be, but the wheels fell off a couple of times to let them back in the game and it cost us. That’s baseball. It’s a tough sport and every little thing is magnified, especially at this level.”

St. Clairsville tallied twice in the third on back-to-back RBI singles with two out by Caiden Bailey and Hanna. Lynchburg-Clay made it 2-1 in the fourth before the Red Devils went ahead 3-1 on a sacrifice fly by Bailey in the fifth.

Jacob legged out an infield single in the sixth as Colten Florence scored when Jacob’s smash off West trickled down the first base line. However, a runner got caught in a rundown to end the inning.

Hanna retired the first two batters in the sixth before walking pinch-hitter Austin Bell and yielding an infield single to Cody Bell. That’s when Lynchburg-Clay started the runners in an attempt to make something happen, and it worked.

Hanna struck out three and walked five. The southpaw surrendered seven hits and threw 121 pitches, of which 76 were strikes.

St. Clairsville recorded seven hits as well — all singles. Bailey had two.

The Red Devils (22-8) stranded six runners, including one in each of the final five innings.

The loss ended the careers of Balgo, Brody Saunders and Ryan Ivey.

“We’re going to miss them. They are a good group of kids that had outstanding careers,” Sliva said. “They will be hard to replace.”

Lynchburg-Clay advances to Canal Park in Akron next week for the state tournament.

FOUL BALLS

— The start of the game was delayed by nearly two hours due to lightning.

— The umpiring crew were Ohio Valley natives as Sam Jones worked the plate, with Donnie Madzia at first, Mike Cox at second and Jimmy Little at third.

— Cox called a Lynchburg-Clay runner out at second and the batter out at first on an obstruction call in the fourth.

— West finished with 121 pitches, as well. He fanned five and walked three.