Hampshire holds off late Mountain Ridge rally to win 10-7

FROSTBURG — Tuesday’s Hampshire-Mountain Ridge game was a rollercoaster for both teams.

Hampshire led Mountain Ridge 10-2 entering the bottom of the seventh inning.

The Miners (4-10) rallied, scoring five runs to get within three, but the Trojans (11-5) held on for a 10-7 win.

“Very disappointed in us, we tend to get on a rollercoaster,” Hampshire manager Ken Maiers said. “We need to learn how to play seven innings with the passion that we do in one inning. Once we do that, we’re gonna be pretty tough.”

Tied at 1 in the top of the fourth, Hampshire scored a touchdown with a seven-run frame.

The first eight batters reached base on five singles, a walk and an error.

“As a coach, I’ve gotta do better,” Mountain Ridge skipper Joshua Glass said. “That’s all I can say, that’s on me. Fundamental baseball, we continue to make errors, mental mistakes. I guess I gotta do better to prepare them.”

Brayden Hott and Wyatt Adams each hit two-run singles while Zeke McDonald’s knock scored a run on the throw.

“Just mental errors, throwing the ball around, making unnecessary errors,” Glass said of what went wrong. “Advance guys into scoring position, and they took advantage of it.”

Adams led the Trojans, going 3 for 4 with three RBIs while McDonald went 2 for 4.

With his team trailing 9-2 in the bottom of the fifth, Mountain Ridge’s John Delaney hit a lead-off solo home run on a full count deep to right.

Ayden Crabtree added a run for Hampshire in the top of the sixth on a base hit to right.

Crabtree went six innings, allowing three runs on six hits and five walks with three strikeouts.

“Normally, he’s more of a strike thrower,” Maiers said. “But he’s a bulldog, that’s all it is. He didn’t have his stuff today, but he was just a bulldog, he fought. He fights everytime out.”

Down 10-2 in the seventh, Dane VanSlyke scored two runs on a double to right.

He scored on a passed ball, then Brayden Glass cut the deficit to 10-7 on a double to left.

“They have grit, they don’t quit,” coach Glass said. “We like to hit the ball, we just gotta clean up the fielding and mental errors.”

A strikeout and popup prevented the comeback.

“We had seven or eight hits in that (fourth) inning, then I think we got a little comfortable with a lead and then we stopped,” Maiers said. “I call it we put the roller skates on and we just started skating around instead of staying focused and battling it out.”

The Trojans opened the scoring on a Mason Wolford sacrifice fly in the first.

Delaney put the Miners on the board with a double in the third and went 2 for 3 with two RBIs and a walk.

Mountain Ridge is at Keyser (4-11) on Thursday at 5 p.m.

Hampshire heads to Musselman on Monday at 7 p.m.