Montrose baseball, softball defeats Foresters

BY HEIDI ZENEFSKI
Sports Correspondent

There was no school for students at Montrose Area High School on Friday, April 18 and it turned out to be a very good Friday for the Meteor baseball and softball teams who traveled to Forest City to take on the Foresters in a Division IV play.

The Lady Meteors squared off against the Lady Foresters winning 12-2 in five innings. Forest City’s Emily Zerby hit a triple and brought in Morgan Gasper and Emily Zerby to score the two runs for the Lady Foresters.

Montrose had quite a bit more success in the batter’s box. Mayana Trecoske had two hits and two RBI’s, Alana Jerauld had three hits. Hailey Rapisardi, who currently has the highest batting average on the team with .556 and is only a freshman, also had two hits and two RBI’s. Second Baseman, Anna Churco, scored three runs for the Lady

Meteors. It was shortstop, Katie Warner, who had a triple and a homerun to earn four RBI’s for Montrose.

Lacy Nealy pitched three innings for the Lady Meteors earning her fourth win in a row and keeping the Lady Foresters to two hits, one walk, and five strike outs. Victoria Hinds pitched the last two innings and gave up three hits and had one strike out.

Emily Lewis pitched five innings for Forest City and faced 32 batters. She gave up 14 hits, had no walks, and two strike outs.

Baseball
On the Forest City baseball field, the game was much tighter with the Foresters keeping pace with the Meteors through most of the game. In fact, the first inning was similar for both teams. Forester pitcher, R.J. Kuruts, who is a freshman, faced five Meteor batters – the first two were able to hit the ball but both were caught for the outs. Kuruts walked Matt Lewis and Matt Benninger got a single hit and stole second base. With two runners in scoring position, Mike Vanness hit a ball deep into centerfield where it was caught by Forest City centerfielder, Adam Kowalewski for the third out, leaving the runners stranded on base with no opportunity to score.

Benninger took the pitcher’s mound for Montrose and also faced five batters in the first inning. Jon DeEsch hit the ball, but was thrown out before reaching base for the first out. Alex Kresock was walked and stole second. Dylan O’Dell got a single hit and advanced Kresock to third ready to score. Benninger was able to prevent the Foresters from scoring by striking out the next two batters to end the inning.

In the second Montrose’s Will Ferrill hit a double, was advanced to third on a single by Andreas Mittmann, and was brought home with a single from Nick Henry who was also the first out when he was caught stealing second base. The inning ended with Montrose up 1-0.

The Foresters tied up the score in the fourth inning with an O’Dell single and advance to second on a throwing error. Mitchell Blake was batter up for Forest City and hit a double which earned him the RBI when O’Dell scored the tying run. The fourth inning ended with a 1-1 tie.

Back-to-back singles by Kyle Watkins and Lewis for Montrose had runners in scoring position when Vanness came to bat and hit a single, but both runners scored earning two RBI’s for Vanness and giving Montrose a 3-1 lead which they would keep for the remainder of the game.

Kuruts pitched six innings for the Foresters giving up five hits, two earned runs, two walks and getting five strike outs.

Benninger pitched seven innings for the Meteors giving up three hits, one earned run, two walks and had ten strike outs.