Parkland High School Baseball

In a non-conference game with Hazelton Area High school, the Trojans demonstrated the ability to claw for runs however possible but still came up short in a hard-fought extra inning game. Parkland opened the scoring in the top of the 2nd when Austin Mueller walked and his courtesy runner John Amato scored on a wild pitch. Hazelton responded in the bottom of the 2nd with a run of their own after a double and Trojan error. In the top of the 3rd, Parkland looked to have a big inning with the bases loaded after Cullan Wadsworth singled, Tyler Bruno was hit by a pitch, and Kyle Friebolin singled. However, the Hazelton defense turned a double play off the bat of Mueller to restrict the damage to only one run. In the bottom of the 3rd Hazelton tied the game at 2-2 after manufacturing a run of their own.

While Parkland was scoreless in the 4th, so was Hazelton thanks to a solid pitching performance by Matt Mellinger (4 IP, 1 ER, 7 K, 2 BB). In the top of the 5th, Parkland loaded the bases again after Bruno and Friebolin each walked, and Mueller was hit by a pitch. Mellinger knocked in one run on another double play by the Hazelton defense. Amato, pinch running for Friebolin, scored when he stole home on a delayed steal attempt by Kyle Novobilski to extend Parkland’s lead to 4-2. In the 6th, the Trojans scored again, this time after Ethan Imler was walked, advanced to second on a sacrifice bunt by Mike Jenkins, and reached home after being knocked in by Bruno’s RBI single. With the score 5-2, Hazelton scored 3 runs in the bottom of the 6th inning on walks and wild pitches to tie the game.

After no score in the 7th, Parkland looked to take the lead in the top of the 8th after Imler reached base, was sacrificed to 2nd base again by Jenkins, but was tagged out at the plate trying to score on Bruno’s base hit to right. Hazelton, however, fared better when one of their batters walked to reach base, advanced to 2nd on a wild pitch, and scored on an RBI base hit to end the game with a score of 6-5.