SPORTS

Ridgewood baseball takes down Zanesville in extras

J.J. Mickey
jmickeyjr@nncogannett.com

ZANESVILLE – Despite leading Ridgewood 3-0 in its home opener Monday at Jay Payton Field, Zanesville baseball coach Dave Balo was never really comfortable with the lead.

“Three runs isn’t going to be enough to win this game,” he told his team on different occasions.

Balo was right.

The Generals scored three runs in the sixth inning to tie it and added what proved to be the go-ahead run in the eighth inning for a 4-3 victory over the Blue Devils.

It was the season-opener for both schools.

“This game was a classic case of letting a team hang around too long,” Balo said. “We gave them chance after chance to get back in it and you can’t do that against a good, well-coached team or they will beat you.”

Zanesville (0-1) sent eight batters to the plate in the first with Josh Clark and Zach Rutter each getting an RBI on singles and another run scoring on an error for a 3-0 lead.

The Ridgewood (1-0) offense remained stagnant throughout the game, but did get some help from the Blue Devils in the sixth.

The first five batters featured two walks, two hit-by-pitches and an error, which led to three runs and a 3-3 tie.

The Generals took its first lead in the eighth on back-to-back doubles from Caleb Tingle and Dillan Shepler, then held strong defensively in the bottom of the inning to seal the win.

Ridgewood coach Chad Lahna was pleased to see his team battle back after struggling at the plate early in the game.

“Once we settled in a little bit and started swinging at good pitches, things starting happening,” he said. “We did a good job to get the game tied, then Caleb and Dillan came up with some big hits to help us get the lead.”

Lahna was also happy with the poise of sophomore pitcher Braeden Smith, who really settled down after a tough first inning.

“I don’t normally like to have a guy like Braeden go over 80 pitches, but he was getting the job done,” Lahna said. “He got some huge outs and had some big pick-off plays that kept them from getting on the board again.”

Lahna also understands his team has high hopes for this year and he just wants them to take things one game at a time.

“They’ve got pretty high expectations but those don’t really mean anything right now,” he said. “We just want to keep getting better and keep winning games.”

jmickeyjr@gannett.com

Twitter: @TribuneJJMickey