Celebration time

WILLIAMSPORT — The Williamsport baseball team savored victory on Friday night.

The Wildcats took pictures and coach David Warrenfeltz took the Gatorade cooler full of ice water square on his back.

It was celebration time after the Wildcats put a 13-0 thumping on Catoctin in five innings to win the Maryland Class 1A West championship.

In winning their ninth straight game, the Wildcats (17-4) advanced to the state semifinals on Tuesday to play defending state champion St. Michaels at McCurdy Field in Frederick at either 4 or 7 p.m.

“I’m stunned,” Warrenfeltz said of the margin of victory. “Catoctin is a great team. The score is not indicative of Catoctin baseball.”

Williamsport banged out 13 hits to go with six walks. Everyone in the lineup had at least one hit except Tyler Nally — who still contributed with a walk, a hit-by-pitch and a sacrifice fly.

“I’ve said top to bottom, our lineup, we can be tough to pitch to. There aren’t any holes,” said Warrenfeltz.

Four players — Connor Arnone, Tyler Byers, Tyler Shank and Will Bowen — had two hits each. Bowen, Ryan Butts and Nally each had two RBIs.

“The whole season I thought we were a good team,” said Zach Lucas, who had a single, a walk and an RBI and holds the single-season team record with 40 RBIs. “Tonight we pushed runs across anyway we could.”

After splitting two regular-season games, Williamsport took on Catoctin ace R.J. Smith, who entered with a 4-0 record and will head to West Virginia University.

Williamsport countered with its own unbeatean ace, Brendon Colliflower, and the Wildcats got the best of everything right away.

Colliflower was staked to a 2-0 lead in the first inning and made it stand up by firing a three-hitter with only one walk while striking out five, raising his record to 6-0.

“I thought we would get some hits,” said Colliflower. “After we got through the first inning with the lead, I really felt good. I had a good fastball and curve and hit my corners. This just shows we’ve worked really hard as a team this year.”

Colliflower face the minimum nine batters over the first three innings. He allowed a second-inning single to Austin Carter but picked him off first. Catoctin had two runners on base in the fourth but Smith was tagged out at second rounding the bag too far after an infield error.

Cline hit a one-out single in the first and was forced out at second on a grounder by Lucas, who then raced to third on a double by Byers.

Shank faced a 2-2 count but held up on a check swing, to Smith’s dismay. On the next pitch, Smith walked Shank, followed by a free pass to Nally to score Cline with the first run.

Bowen added an infield single deep in the hole at second to score Byers, giving the ’Cats a 2-0 lead despite leaving the bases loaded.

Undaunted, Williamsport knocked Smith from the mound with a six-run second inning, highlighted by RBI hits by Lucas, Byers and Shank and a two-run single by Butts with the bases loaded.

Two Catoctin errors helped Williamsport scored three times in the third, and a final run scored in the fourth.

“We had some hard base hits and some short ones, but I think it just showed our patience at the plate,” said Warrenfeltz. “I really didn’t know what to expect at the beginning of the season, but each of these kids bought in to what we wanted to do.”


Williamsport 13, Catoctin 0
Catoctin    000    00    —    0    3    2
Williamsport    273    1x    —    13    12    1
Smith, Kennedy (2), Tylicki (3) and Johnson. Colliflower and Butts. WP—Colliflower (6-0). LP—Smith (4-1).