DUBOIS — Doug McClintic told his team that they had two choices following Tuesday’s heartbreaking 5-4 loss in the District 9 title game.
It could either sulk and let that loss end its season or bounce back with two wins and earn a spot in the PIAA playoffs.
Based on Friday’s result, it’s clear the Coudersport baseball team chose the latter.
The Falcons put together a near-flawless performance in a 13-0, five inning rout of District 4’s Sayre to win the District 4-6-9 Class AA sub-regional and earn a berth in Monday’s PIAA Class AA first round.
Coudersport topped District 6’s West Shamokin in the first round of the sub-regional Thursday and came back to Showers Field a mere 15 hours later (first pitch Friday was at 11 o’clock) and didn’t miss a beat.
“I’m very pleased with this team,” McClintic said. “They are playing as good of baseball as I could expect them to right now.”
The Falcons (18-4) jumped on the Redskins early with three runs in the bottom of the first and added seven in the second to blow the game open.
Nearly every one of Coudy’s 12 hits in the game was a hard-hit ball into Showers Field’s sprawling outfield.
All nine players in the Falcons’ starting lineup had at least one hit or an RBI.
“The bats are coming alive and the fact that not just one guy is doing it is impressive,” McClintic said. “I totally believed in this offense from the beginning of the season and we really had to work hard for it. I thought it would come along quicker, but I’m really starting to see what we really believed this team could be.”
To McClintic’s point, Coudersport has scored 29 runs over its four playoff games to date.
Eli Ayers got the Falcons started with an RBI single in the first inning and led the team with two hits and two RBIs.
Jacob Pitcher had a two-run single in the second and Blake Burgett drove in two runs on a triple in the fourth.
Things were going so well for Coudy that even the plays that ended in outs were scoring runs. Both Owen Chambers and Jackson Glover had sacrifice flies while teammate Hunter Redmond had an RBI groundout.
The Falcons also scored three runs off of three Redskin errors.
And for as lopsided as the score turned, Sayre certainly had its chances early.
The Redskins put two runners on base with one out in both the first and second innings, but failed to push a run across in either opportunity.
For the game, Sayre left eight runners on base and finished with eight hits.
But Coudersport starting pitcher Blake Burgett — who worked three scoreless innings — got out of each jam.
“I call it Blake being Blake,” McClintic said. “You think you have him on the ropes, and he is tough to square up. It almost seems like he gets more tough as he gets guys on base. He settles in there and the guys obviously get very aggressive, and he’s Blake.”
A.J. Redmond came on in relief and worked two scoreless innings for Coudersport to finish off the victory.
Coudersport will face District 5 champion Conemaugh Township on Monday at Somerset High School. The Indians are 21-1 on the season and enter the PIAA postseason on a 16-game win streak.
But McClintic is confident in his group, especially if it can bounce back like it did over the last two games or even when things got tough in that D-9 title game after the Falcons lost a four-run lead.
“That’s what we talk about all the time is not hanging their heads,” he said. “Even in that (title) game, we had three costly errors in that (third inning) and should have easily been out of that inning.
“(We) could have played woulda, coulda, shoulda, but these guys moved on. We kept it 4-4, we could have hung our heads and the guy got lucky on a bad pitch. That’s the end of that but we move on.”
