OJR's baseball ends with playback loss to Methacton

POTTSTOWN -- With the final home run of Robbie Patete's high-school career, the mammoth third baseman illustrated how far the Owen J. Roberts' baseball team had journeyed.

Ultimately, the drive well out to left did nothing more than stave off a 10-run mercy rule in Tuesday's season-ending, 12-5, loss to Methacton. Symbolically, it illustrated the vast improvement and drive that defined a team overcoming heavy graduation losses.

"I just didn't want to give up," Patete said, climbing the hill toward the parking lot for the last time. "We played hard all season and needed to go out playing hard."

Despite a collection of upperclassmen, the Wildcats entered this season as a team  with limited varsity experience outside of Patete, catcher Dave Raifsnider and ace pitcher Tim Ponto. This was due to a talented Class of '10 that included David Vining, Brandon Engelhardt, Paul Kochu, Steve Piskai, Jake Tammaro and PAC-10 Player of the Year Jeff Wiand.

Those players guided the Wildcats to a 25-6 season that ended with a 7-0 loss to  West Chester Henderson in the Pennsylvania state championship. Not willing to use their absence as crutch, the returnees combined for one more run.

Sent to the playbacks round of the PIAA District One, Class-AAAA playoffs after a  quarterfinal loss to Council Rock North on May 27, the Wildcats needed to beat Methacton, then West Chester East to earn the final state tournament berth.

Opting to save Ponto for a potential second game, OJR started Sean Muscovitch, and the Warriors' Dave Toomey greeted him rudely with a leadoff homer.

The Wildcats (18-9) had runners on second and third with no outs in the bottom of the first after a walk and error, but failed to score.

"That takes the wind out of your sails a little bit, that's for sure," OJR head coach Greg Gilbert said. "We score a couple of runs there, take the lead, it changes the game a little. When you don't, you have to be come back from that. To compound that, they came right in and starting scoring."

Right-fielder Tyler Kirkpatrick began the second inning with a home run. After allowing two more base runners, Zach Boehmer relieved and recorded two outs. But Nick Strizziere walked to load the bases, and first baseman Joey Casselberry pounded a grand slam to put the Warriors up 6-0.

"To be down 6-0 hurt," Gilbert said. "To their credit, they didn't quit. It just wasn't our day."

Ponto relieved to start the third inning, but the Warriors pelted him too, scoring five runs during a four-hit, two-walk fourth inning.

When a run in the sixth threatened to end the game via mercy rule, Jared Pinelli walked with two outs and no one on. Dan Brady followed with single and Patete clubbed his ninth home run of the season.

"Our senior leadership was fantastic this season," Gilbert said. "A lot of people take senior leadership for granted, and that's not always the case. Just because you have seniors who've been around doesn't mean you'll get leadership. Between Robbie and Dave Raifsnider, that leadership is going to be difficult to replace."

The wins may be tough to replace, too, as the Wildcats are entering a rebuilding phase, with the goal to develop younger players. They'll lose the trio of Patete, Raifsnider and Ponto, the No. 3-4-5 hitters.

Then again, this season wasn't supposed to go this long either.

"I look at it as a success because we lost all those guys," said Patete, who heads to East Stroudsburg University next season. "It was huge for us to come back and still win. It was a good season overall. It just didn't work out like last year. Playing in this game was huge. Our season was great. We did great. We played hard all season."