SYRACUSE — Tuesday afternoon’s high school baseball game in Syracuse between Whitko and Wawasee ended the only way it could have – with a dropped pop fly. Committing a total of eight errors, the visiting Whitko Wildcats’ (4-3) last one was a dropped fly ball behind first base, which allowed the Wawasee Warriors (3-4) to score and end the game with a 13-3 victory after five innings. “We have to make more plays,” Whitko coach Erik Hisner said. “We gave a team more than three outs, and each time we did, they made us pay.” After getting ahead 2-0 in the top of the first, Whitko saw Wawasee score five runs in the bottom of the frame. Two of Wawasee’s runs scored in the first inning came when a fly ball by senior Drew Voirol sailed to right field, but was dropped, allowing senior Dylan Wallace to score. The ball was then dropped a second time in the outfield, which sent Wawasee junior Jacob Rhoades sprinting to home base. Once the ball did reach the infield, the relay throw was errantly thrown to the back stop, allowing Voirol to advance to second base. That one play accounted for three errors, and once the inning ended, Wawasee had scored five runs on just three hits, while Whitko had committed five errors. “We hit the ball, but they also gave us some freebies,” Wawasee coach John Blunk said about his squad, which did post 11 hits on the evening. Whitko cut the lead to 5-3 after freshman Ethan Nicodemus drove in senior Nathan Sherrard in the top of the third, but that was as close as the Wildcats would get to regaining the lead. “We’d get guys on base, we just needed to get one or two more hits in the third and fourth innings to get a few more runs,” Hisner said. “Down 5-3, I still felt pretty good about things. I liked our attitude, our intensity and I really thought we were going to make a run at them.” Trailing 5-3 going into the bottom of the fourth, things began to come apart for the Wildcats again, as Wawasee produced another five-run inning, highlighted by a two-out RBI-double by Voirol, which was followed by a two-run single by senior John Beer, which increased the lead to 10-3. After the Warriors scored another three runs in the bottom of the fifth, senior pitcher Cody Thomas received the win, going four innings, allowing five hits and three runs. “Cody battled pretty well,” Blunk said. “He didn’t have his ‘A’ stuff, and he knew it from the start. He battled, threw 83 pitches and that’s a lot of pitches through four innings.” Nicodemus was on the mound for the Wildcats, getting the loss through three-and-two-thirds innings of work, allowing nine hits, although just five of the 10 runs scored were earned. “The wind is not an easy thing to play up here on this plateau,” Blunk said about the windy conditions at Wawasee’s field, which attributed to many dropped fly balls, including one by Wawasee. “The first time I’ve seen in 20 years that this wind is blowing in.” When the Warriors weren’t getting on base via Wildcats errors, they were getting base hits, as eight of the nine starters posted at least one, led by Beer, Wallace, and Voirol, who each got two. Whitko’s offense was led by junior Austin Mort, who had two hits, while Nicodemus drove in two runs. The two teams will face each other again in Syracuse on April 23 as part of Wawasee’s Dirtbag Classic, a round-robin tournament. Following that, the two may square off again in Class 3A Sectional 21, a proposition Blunk isn’t too keen on. “I don’t like having to play any team three times in one season,” he said. Before any rematches, Whitko is back in action today at home against Churubusco, while Wawasee hosts Columbia City Thursday.
