The Cambridge varsity baseball team overcame a rain delay and a light outage before withstanding a late charge to hold on for a 5-4 victory in a game played at River Ridge HS, Thursday, April 21st. The skies opened up right before the game causing a 30 minute delay. Not long after that power to the area went out, so the teams began the game in the hope that the power would eventually come on.
Before that would happen the power of the Cambridge bats would make an appearance, if only for an inning. In the second, Jacob Cabe led off with a single to right. Luke Foote followed that up with another single to right. Junior Hayden Onorato came to the plate and quickly got down 0-2. However, the lefty took the next pitch and launched a triple deep to center field that drove in the first runs of the game. A Cameron Moore single through a drawn in infield pushed the score to 3-0. A balk and a wild pitch moved Moore to third where he was driven in by hot-hitting Brett Hawkins, who singled to right.
Bears starter Jon Mullis worked around trouble in the first, and stranded another two runners in the second to keep the score 4-0. He buckled down and had 1-2-3 innings in the third and fourth. Moving into the fifth, lighting was becoming a real issue. The power had not been restored, and the fifth would likely have been the last playable inning. The Bears did not let that stand in the way of adding to their lead, however. Hawkins led off the inning with his third hit of the night, a single to right. Bradley Wiedman took an 0-2 pitch and lined a single to center to put runners on first and second. Senior Pete Gottschalk laid down a perfect sac bunt that moved both runners over with one out. Conner Young came to the plate and lofted a sacrifice fly to left that drove in Hawkins and push the score to 5-0.
Miraculously, the lights returned in the bottom of the inning to loud applause by the Bears fans at the game. Unfortunately, River Ridge pushed across a couple of runs in the inning with the help of a couple of hits and a walk. Cambridge avoided more damage with an inning-ending 4-6-3 double play.
Other than a single by Hawkins, his fourth of the game, the Bears offense stayed silent. Mullis threw a perfect sixth, setting up an eventful seventh inning. A one-out single, a walk and a sac fly pushed the score to 5-3. A wild pitch made the score 5-4. But Mullis struck out the Knights cleanup hitter to end the game and complete the series sweep with the 5-4 victory.
Mullis went the distance, allowing four runs on five hits with eight strikeouts and four walks. He picked up his 8th win of the season in the process. Brett Hawkins was the hitting star, going 4 for 4 with an RBI and a run scored. Hayden Onorato had the biggest hit of the game with his second inning triple and two RBI. Conner Young and Cameron Moore each drove in a run, while Moore, Foote, Cabe and Onorato scored runs.
The Bears now proceed to round one of the GHSA State Playoffs next week against SW DeKalb. Game times are as follows:
Friday April 29th
DH at SW DeKalb HS 2pm & 4:30pm
Saturday April 30th
Game 3 (If necessary) Time TBD
Go Bears!
