by Vince Rodemer
BEAVER SPRINGS--West Snyder got the clutch hit they've been looking for from Hunter Jordan.
Unfortunately, Montgomery's got a few more and their outfielders made several huge plays to kill any momentum early in the game and the visitors knocked off Post 942 8-5 in an American Legion baseball game on Tuesday night.
"I think from what I was hearing from the guys, they were happy to hit the ball harder," West Snyder coach Scott Sharp said. "The other thing (they were saying) is that we close. The last time we played these guys, they played very, very good defense and held us when we could have been scoring. Their defense kept in the game quite a bit."
The visitors put two runs on the board with RBI singles from Jensen Drick and Bailey Wilk.
In the bottom half, West Snyder had runners on first and third with two outs when Devon Leister lofted a liner into the left center gap, but Wilk quickly closed it and snared the ball to end the inning.
The following inning it was more of the same from Wilk and right fielder Brayden Strouse.
Wilk went back on Aaron Sharp's deep fly ball and caught it facing away from the field on the run to rob Sharp of at least three bases.
That play instantly saved the visitors a run when Dylan Loss came up and smashed a double over Strouse's head.
An error put runners on the corners with two outs and brought up Travis Zechman.
The left hander lined a ball to right, but Strouse came in and made a diving catch to end the inning.
Montgomery added a run in the third and another in the fourth on a wild pitch to double its lead to 4-0.
West Snyder lit the scoreboard for the first time in the bottom of the fourth.
Ashton Martin reached on an infield single and moved to second when the second baseman threw it away.
Jordan followed with a single and Devon Leister knocked Martin in with a groundout to make it 4-1.
Aaron Sharp followed with an RBI single to right to cut the lead to 4-2 before Montgomery starter Gage Yohn got out of it.
Following Chris Elliott's scoreless inning of relief in the fifth, Post 942 came back for more offensively.
Zane Leister and Zechman both singled with one out and following a groundout, Jordan connected for a two-run game-tying single to center.
"It's very encouraging (to see the clutch hit)." Scott Sharp said. "What I'm seeing from the guys here (is that) we are starting to put the ball in play and hit the ball harder. I'm hoping the hits are going to come in when we have runners on base. It seems that we get guys on and get them in scoring position…I think every inning but two, we left runners on third base. That's tough, especially the first inning when we had a runner on third and no outs or one out and didn't score him."
Had another run scored for West Snyder, there may have been a different result.
"I was going to go with Aaron, I told him to get loose if we get the lead," Scott Sharp said. "When they scored a couple of runs, I decided to stay with Chris. He's a nice little pitcher and he needs this experience. He's a young guy."
Yohn got out of the inning though and set the stage for Mike Alexander's go-ahead two-run double in the top of the sixth.
Montgomery got two more on a Drick two-run double in the top of the seventh to assume an 8-4 lead before Martin's RBI single settled the score at the final, 8-5.
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