DIV. II BASEBALL Canfield squeaks past Howland

The Cardinals held off the Tigers, 2-1, and will face Poland today.
STRUTHERS -- When Herb Score was broadcasting games for the Cleveland Indians, he often reminded listeners that unearned runs "count."
In Wednesday's Howland-Canfield Division II district baseball semifinal game, they counted big as all three runs in the game were unearned.
The difference was that the Cardinals had two unearned runs to the Tigers one as Canfield advanced to the championship game.
Tonight at 6:30 p.m., Canfield will play Poland at Cene Park. The winner will advance to next week's Hudson regional.
Cardinals had two hits
Canfield (20-7) won despite getting just two hits off of Adam Solich (7-2). The righty walked three as he allowed only a first-inning single to Josh McKenney and a bad-hop run-scoring single to Kyle Banna in the fourth.
Meanwhile, Joe Rosko of Canfield was able to pitch out of jams as the Tigers left eight men on in the game. Rosko (8-0) had six strikeouts, walked three and allowed seven hits in his complete-game victory.
"Joe was a bulldog out there for us," Canfield coach Tony Ross said. "He carried us. We made some plays in the field.
"The lack of hits we had was due to Solich. He kept the ball low and got a lot of groundball outs," Ross said. "We didn't strike out for the second game in a row."
The game began with a leadoff single by Solich, the first of his three hits in the game. Rosko picked him off at first base.
Tony Pozega followed with a hit and after a strikeout was thrown out attempting to steal second base to end the inning.
"Early in the game we wanted to try to run," Howland coach Tom Eschman said. "We kind of ran ourselves out of things. Their lefty has a good move."
Ross agreed.
"Two hits in the first inning, and two baserunners possibly in scoring position, and we were able to pick one off and get one stealing," Ross said. "That was huge."
Scored without a hit
Canfield scored without the benefit of a hit in the third. Sean Baker walked to lead off.
C.J. Morris bunted and was safe at first on a bad throw putting runners at first and second. A wild pitch advanced the runners a base. After one out on a grounder that kept the runners on hold, Zach Guerrieri hit a slow roller. The Tigers settled for the out at first, allowing Baker to score.
The next inning, Canfield scored again. With one out, Rosko was safe on an error. He advanced to second on a groundout and scored when Banna hit a ball past the mound. The ball took a bad hop over the head of the shortstop for the run-scoring single.
Hits by Manoli Pahoulis and Jake Kakavros put runners on the corners in the fourth inning for the Tigers (12-12) before Rosko was able to get a called third strike ending the uprising.
Howland scores in fifth
Jonathon Brady walked to start the Howland fifth. Zack Byler advanced him with a sacrifice bunt and he was able to move to third on a hit by Solich. Pozega hit a ball to third and a bad throw to second base allowed Brady to score, cutting the lead to 2-1. Rosko retired the next two men to end the rally.
A two-out triple by T.J. Stoian followed by a walk to Brady put two men on again in the sixth for Howland (12-12). Rosko got out of the jam on a fly to center to keep the lead for the Cards.
Rosko ended the game by getting all three men out in order in the seventh.
"We left a lot of runners on base. We had a lot of opportunities," Eschman said. "Give their pitcher credit, we took them to the wire but could not punch another couple in."
Canfield and Poland will be meeting for the third straight year in the district.
"It's tough, but I can tell you it will not take much to get our kids up to play for this one," Ross said.