HYDE — The Clearfield Area High School baseball team will be seeking its second District 9 Class AAAA championship in three years Wednesday at Showers Field in DuBois, and the No. 3-seeded Bison have a familiar opponent standing in their way.
Punxsutawney, the No. 1 seed because of schedule points, will be on a mission, too, having been sidetracked by the Bison in the Class AAAA semifinals the last two years after reigning as Class AAA kings for 13 consecutive seasons, denying Clearfield of titles a few times.
In 2017, when the PIAA changed from four to six classifications for the sport, the Bison nipped the Chucks 8-7 in 10 innings. The outcome was 8-2 last May.
And they’ll be putting similar records on the line for the 4 p.m. final, the Bison at 12-9 after upending No. 2 seed St. Marys 5-1 Friday and the Chucks at 10-9 following their third win over Bradford, 11-3, in the other semifinal.
“I said going in, District 9 was pretty much up in the air with three teams pretty equal, and that’s the way it’s panned out in the playoffs,” Clearfield coach Sid Lansberry said.
The Bison are 6-0 while the Chucks are 7-3 against the five common opponents.
In addition to ending St. Marys’ season, Clearfield owns victories over DuBois 8-0, Brookville 22-12 in six innings, Bradford 2-1 and Curwensville 5-2 and 13-0 in five innings.
Punxsy swept Bradford 4-3 and 6-2 earlier in the season and beat Curwensville 14-4 but split with the other three teams in District 9 League games. The Chucks nipped DuBois 13-12 after losing 4-3 in eight innings, edged St. Marys 5-4 and then lost 8-7 to the Flying Dutch and were beaten 15-8 by Brookville after having edged the Raiders 4-3.
“They’re like us in a lot of ways,” Lansberry said. “They play a tough schedule, they’ve won some big games, and they’ve lost some close games.
“They don’t have a lot of power, but they’ve got some good hitters at the top of the order, four or five hitting over .300. They have three kids who have pitched quite a bit.”
When the teams met at the Bison Sports Complex April 29, the Bison jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the first inning but managed only two more hits the rest of the way and saw the Chucks rally for a 6-5 victory.
“We kind of went to sleep and before you knew it, the game got away from us,” Lansberry said.
Isaac Knarr (1-1) was the pitcher of record, registering his lone win after working 5-1/3 innings and allowing five hits and three earned runs. Dylan Huey closed it out for the save.
Huey (.312, 16 RBIs) started at first base, with Andrew Britton (.255) at second, Andrew Greenblatt (.358) at short and Dylan Ishman (.321, 18 RBIs) at third. Ishman fueled the comeback against the Bison by driving in three runs.
Aidan Johnston (.217), Daren Byers (.367, 12 RBIs) and Sheldon Young (.262) were the outfielders, and Adison Neal (.321) did the catching.
Greenblatt (2-0, 3.26 ERA) has pitched the most innings (43) by far, Knarr (5.47 ERA) next with 24, followed by relief specialist Huey (3-2, 3.57 ERA) with 15-2/3. All have appeared in about half of the games, and all average almost one strikeout per inning.
Clearfield has its own trio of hurlers in right-hander Eli Glass (5-2, 2.86 ERA) and southpaws Cade Walker (4-3, 2.93 ERA) and Hunter Dixon (2-2, 2.31 ERA). Each is at 40 innings or more.
Glass (.349, 21 RBIs) started against St. Marys and Walker (.241, 14 RBIs) was in left field before coming on to earn a save with three hitless, scoreless innings of relief work.
The rest of the Bison lineup will find Allan Myers (.284, 15 RBIs) catching, Karson Rumsky at first base, Kyle Elensky at second, Caullin Reed (.300, 18 RBIs) at short, Hayden Williams (.400, 13 RBIs) at third, Nate Barr (.333, 12 RBIs in center field and Harrison Peacock (.234, 13 RBIs) in right.
The Bison’s average is .279 with 31 extra base hits, compared to the Chucks’ .304 and 15 extra base hits. Their runs per game are 6.2 and 5.7, respectively.
So, moving on to the PIAA Class AAAA first round Monday against the District 7 champ most likely will come down to one or two hits, plays in the field or mistakes.
“It’s gonna be another challenge for us,” Lansberry said.
No. 4 seed Blackhawk (16-4) and No. 6 Beaver (13-8) meet in the WPIAL title game Wednesday.
Bison Scoreboard:
Date Opponent Score Record
3/25 @ Bald Eagle Area 10 – 1 1 – 0
3/28 @ Huntingdon 6 – 8 1 – 1
4/02 PHILIPSBURG-OSCEOLA 1 – 2 1 – 2
4/04 CURWENSVILLE 5 – 2 2 – 2
4/05 @ Tyrone ppd. 2 – 2
4/06 @ Tyrone 2 – 3, 9 inn. 2 – 3
4/08 PENNS VALLEY 6 – 2 3 – 3
4/09 BROOKVILLE 22 – 12 4 – 3
4/11 @ Central 10 – 4 5 – 3
4/16 BELLEFONTE ppd. 5 – 3
4/17 @ Bellefonte 0 – 8 5 – 4
4/18 BALD EAGLE AREA 4 – 2 6 – 4
4/23 HUNTINGDON 6 – 4 7 – 4
4/25 @ Philipsburg-Osceola 3 – 4 7 – 5
4/29 PUNXSUTAWNEY 5 – 6 7 – 6
4/30 TYRONE 3 – 13 7 – 7
5/03 @ Penns Valley 4 – 3 8 – 7
5/06 CENTRAL ppd. 8 – 7
5/07 CENTRAL 5 – 10 8 – 8
5/08 @ Bradford 2 – 1 9 – 8
5/09 BELLEFONTE 10 – 23 9 – 9
5/13 @ Curwensville ppd. 9 – 9
5/16 @ Curwensville 13 – 0 10 – 9
5/17 @ DuBois 8 – 0 11 – 9
5/23 District 9 AAAA Playoffs
5/23 vs. St. Marys @ DuBois 5 – 1 12 – 9
5/29 vs. Punxsy @ DuBois
