When Will Christian chalked up his 7th strike out on the night of May 16, Methacton not only avenged their 13-inning loss to Phoenixville in the PAC Championship last year, but the Warriors saw their first title in a decade.
Christian began his campaign with a strikeout on the Phantoms leadoff batter. Then, he allowed a single and a stolen base, but two flyouts ended the inning with no damage.
No other Phoenixville player would step onto second base until the final stanza. After the first inning, Christian walked a batter in the fifth, allowed a single in the sixth, and gave up another walk in the seventh. The sophomore recorded all 21 outs in his complete game shutout.
The Warriors two runs were scored by Tommy Kratz in the first and Casey Behan in the third with RBI’s coming from a Chase McNally sacrifice fly and Tripp Shytle single.
A dream scenario opened up for the Warriors with bases loaded in the first inning as Kratz was hit by a pitch to lead off the game. Then Casey Humes walked and Nick Remish reached first on an error. That’s when McNally hit the sacrifice fly to right field, allowing Kratz to tag up and score.
Then the bases became loaded again when Behan reached first on catcher’s interference. This was the most controversial call of this game. The home plate umpire who made the call was the same umpire who called first base interference in the seventh inning of the PAC championship last season on Methacton’s first baseman Matt Christian when the Warriors were up 2-1. Matt Christian is the cousin of Will Christian, the starting pitcher of this game.
No more runs scored in the first inning.
The pitching duel heightened between Christian and Phoenixville’s Christan Cervino through the rest of the game. Methacton had just three hits in the entire game and the second of the three came as an RBI in the third from Shytle to score Behan. The third hit came in the bottom of the sixth with two outs from Bryce Lohsen off of Thommy Whitesel who pitched just one inning in relief of Cervino.
Phoenixville allowed double digit base runners on the night, stemming from four walks, two hit batters, a catcher’s interference call and three hits. Methacton’s Christian allowed two walks and two hits on 26 batters faced. The Warrior committed one error.
Coach Paul Spiewak said every time he goes to Spring-Ford’s Ram Stadium, he remembers Methacton’s only PAC championship until this point in 2014. Now he will add Boyertown’s Bear Stadium into his memory.
He added that the Warriors ended up winning the district championship in that 2014 season, noting that the team got hot off of their PAC championship run.
There is not a hotter team right now in the PAC than the Warriors, a team that has the three-seed in the upcoming district playoffs. Methacton was the three-seed in last year’s district playoffs as well, but the team fell early. This year the expectations are higher.
Shytle said that his goal was to get right back to the spot they were in last year. And here they are.
