PERRYSBURG — Perrysburg baseball defeated Tiffin Columbian, 4-2, on Wednesday to advance to next week’s Division I district baseball tournament.
This Wednesday, Perrysburg will travel to Liberty-Benton High School to take on Toledo St. John’s at 2 p.m. in the district semifinal.
On Friday at 5 p.m., the Perrysburg-St. John’s winner will take on the Clay-Sylvania Northview winner for the district championship at Liberty-Benton and the right to move on to the regional tournament.
In the win over the Tornadoes, Perrysburg junior pitcher Matt Hubbard struck out 11, walked one, allowed four hits and two runs through seven innings. Hubbard threw 105 pitches, including 71 pitches for strikes, while facing 26 batters.
All the runs were scored in the first two innings, with the Tornadoes scoring once in each inning, and Perrysburg scoring three in the first and added one in the second.
Perrysburg outhit Columbian, 8-4, and took advantage of three errors while the Yellow Jackets were perfect in the field. However, the Jackets stranded 10 baserunners, the Tornadoes stranded just three.
Junior Brady Zilles led Perrysburg at the plate, going 2-for-4 with a double, stolen base, and RBI and junior Abram Hire went 2-for-3 with two stolen bases and an RBI.
The Yellow Jackets had a field day stealing bases with six thefts, including one each by senior Matt Gast, junior Trent Bezek, and sophomore Landon Winters.
Gast, Hubbard, Winters and freshman Brayden Heitmeyer had base hits, and sophomore Braxton Mefferd had a sacrifice bunt.
Perrysburg 7, Springfield 3
PERRYSBURG — On Friday in a Northern Lakes League tilt, Perrysburg avenged an earlier loss to Springfield, defeating the visiting Blue Devils, 7-3.
Freshman Tyler Palmer started on the mound and got the win, striking out four, walking one, spreading out nine hits and allowing two earned runs through six innings.
Winters closed in the seventh, striking out two, walking one, and not allowing a hit or run. In addition, Perrysburg junior catchers, Nick Oros and Quinn Weber, threw out two Springfield baserunners trying to steal.
Springfield outhit Perrysburg 9-8, but Weber went 2-for-3, junior Jack Losee went 2-for-2 with an RBI and Hire had the Jackets’ only extra base hit, a triple.
Bezek, Winters, and Zilles had base hits, Bezek and Losee laid down sacrifice bunts, and Bezek had Perrysburg’s only stolen base, although Springfield junior catcher Evan McGannon threw out one potential base stealer.
For the Blue Devils, junior Adam Iserman went 2-for-2 with a double and two RBIs, and junior Will Scott went 2-for-4 with an RBI.
Jack Semler, Nick Winslow, Collin Leasure, Dallas Allen, and Connor Berry had base hits for Springfield, and McGannon had a stolen base.
Senior Sam Johnson started on the mound for Springfield, striking out two, walking three, and allowing eight hits and five earned runs through 5.1 innings, taking the loss.
Junior Gavin Robinson got the final two outs for the Blue Devils.
