Tyrone senior Brandon Maceno seems to pitch his best when the situation is at its worst.
\nIn two years of mostly relief work for the Golden Eagles, there hasn\u2019t been a lineup yet that has shaken his steady demeanor, nor has there been a batter who has forced the diminutive right-hander to give even an inch when he stares into the batter\u2019s box.
\nIt was a trend that continued yesterday in Maceno\u2019s second appearance of the 2005 season. Called on to close the game out in the fourth after starter Ben Gummo left with soreness in his throwing arm, he allowed only two runs \u2013 one earned – in four innings, struck out five, left five runners stranded, and closed the game by striking out Matt Brubaker with runners on first and second to seal Tyrone\u2019s 7-5 victory over the Rams at the Harry K. Sickler Athletic Complex.
\nIt was a masterful performance for a pitcher who had little more than nine warm-up tosses before relieving Gummo, who took the mound to start the fourth inning but left before completing his own warm-up routine.
\n\u201cBrandon just went out there and competed,\u201d said manager Tom Coleman, whose team improved to 3-0. \u201cWe handed him the ball because we trusted him, and he came in and took momentum away from them when they were starting to heat up by giving us four solid innings.\u201d
\nPart of Maceno\u2019s success in handling a Valley line-up that in the third came alive with three runs and three hits was his confidence in attacking the strike zone. Along with his five K\u2019s, Maceno walked no one and threw more than six pitches to any one batter only four times.
\nMaceno also got his first hit of the season, as once again the Golden Eagles pounded the ball at the plate. Tyrone had 10 hits off two different Valley pitchers and had an inning of at least four runs for the fifth time in three games.
\nFour of Tyrone\u2019s hits went for extra bases, including back-to-back home runs by Clint Wilson and Derrick Soellner in the first inning that allowed Tyrone to build a 4-0 lead.
\n\u201cSometimes it\u2019s a pitfall when your offense produces as well as ours has,\u201d said Coleman. \u201cWe got a nice lead and then went a little flat, and then their pitchers made some adjustments on us.\u201d
\nAndrew Weaver took the loss for the Rams, who fell to 0-2. After a rough start that saw him surrender six earned runs over the first two innings, Weaver settled and at one point retired eight of nine batters, but his problem was he could never recover when he found himself in a jam, where Tyrone pitchers could.
\nIn the first inning, he allowed back-to-back doubles by Gummo and Brit Mingle, followed by the back-to-back homers of Soellner and Wilson. Wilson\u2019s came on a first-pitch fastball and went deep over the right-center fence, while Soellner\u2019s was on an 0-1 fastball and cleared the fence at dead center.
\nIn the second, Weaver walked the bases loaded, setting up Wilson to drive home two more runs when he ripped a single to right-center, making it 6-0.
\nThey were big plays made by Tyrone that were imitated but not duplicated by Valley. In the first, Gummo walked two batters to load the bases with one out, but he got out of the jam by striking out Josh Kieffer and getting Devon Altiero to dribble one back to the mound for the 1-3 putout.
\nThings went south for Gummo in the third when a Nate Frankenberger double and a Josh Kieffer single allowed the Rams to cut the score in half at 6-3 with just one out, but even then Gummo regrouped to retire two of the next three batters and leave one runner stranded.
\nTyrone committed two errors in the game, with only one leading to run when a Wilson throwing gaff allowed Matt Brubaker to score in the fourth making it 6-4. But neither error was fatal, which Coleman attributed to the Eagles\u2019 experience.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve learned to put those things behind us,\u201d Coleman said. \u201cThese players have been there before and they didn\u2019t let that affect us.\u201d
\nDIAMOND NOTES: Nine-hitter Josh Clark scored two runs, including a much-needed insurance run in the sixth when he turned a lead-off single into a run with a Mertiff single and a Gummo sacrifice, eventually scoring on a wild pitch by Norman Wenrick \u2026 Wilson lifted his team-leading RBI total to eight \u2026 Gummo notched his second win of the season \u2026 Wilson will start today when the Eagles play Mount Union on the road at 4:15. The game was originally scheduled for tomorrow but was rescheduled earlier this week.
\n Tyrone 7 Penns Valley 5
\nPenns Valley \u2013 Foor, ss, 4-1-1; S. Altiero, cf, 3-1-2; Hull, lf, 3-0-0; Weaver, p, 3-0-0; Wernick, p, 0-0-0; Frankenberger, dh, 3-1-1; Jo. Kieffer, c, 4-1-1; D. Altiero, 3b, 4-0-1; Homan, 4-0-1; Rachau, 1b, 2-0-0; Ja. Kieffer, ph, 1-0-1; Brubaker, rf, 4-1-1. TOTALS: 32-5-9.
\nTyrone \u2013 Mertiff, ss, 3-0-1; Gummo, p-2b, 1-2-1; Mingle, rf, 2-1-1; Wilson, 1b, 4-1-2; Morrissey, cr, 0-0-0; Soellner, c, 4-1-2; Gillmen, 3b, 3-0-1; Maceno, 2b-p, 3-0-1; Stottler, 3-0-0; Levinson, lf, 0-0-0; Clark, cf, 2-2-1. TOTALS: 25-7-10.
\nPENNS VALLEY 003 200 0 \u2013 5-9-0
\nTYRONE 420 001 X \u2013 7-10-2
\n2B: Gummo, Mingle, Frankenberger
\nHR: Wilson, Soellner
\nRBI: Wilson 4, Mingle, Soellner, Frankenberger 2, Jo. Kieffer, D. Altiero
\nK: Gummo 3, Maceno 5, Weaver 3
\nBB: Gummo 4, Weaver 5.
\nWP: Maceno LP: Weaver <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tyrone senior Brandon Maceno seems to pitch his best when the situation is at its worst. In two years of mostly relief work for the Golden Eagles, there hasn\u2019t been a lineup yet that has shaken his steady demeanor, nor has there been a batter who has forced the diminutive right-hander to give even an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports-news-in-the-tyrone-pennsylvania-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43155\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}