McDonald wins battle of the Blue Devils

By JOHN BASSETTI
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
STRUTHERS -- Somewhere in the Western Reserve psyche, there must be a mental stumbling block when facing McDonald.
It took just two innings for a living example to manifest itself in Monday's Division IV district semifinal baseball game at Cene Park.
That's when McDonald scored four runs to overcome a 3-0 start by Western Reserve in the third meeting between the Inter Tri-County League schools this season.
McDonald's 6-3 victory vaulted the Blue Devils (13-8) into the district title game today against Windham, the defending district champion.
"We've had starts like this before, and they haven't come out very pretty," McDonald coach Dan Williams said of games with starts similar to Monday's. "But the kids bounced back at the bottom of the [first] inning and got one back and, from then on out, we played a real solid baseball game. Our kids, for whatever reason, get up and get focused for them."
Western Reserve (13-7) got its only hit in the game's first half-inning when Dave Drevna doubled against Steven Hughes.
"That kid has been solid," Williams said of Hughes (5-1). "He lost the first game of the year [6-5 to Sebring], then he's won five straight. He's a senior and we're going to put the ball in his hands. He's gotten stronger as the year went on. After the first half inning, we played a complete game."
Mike Thomas had two singles for McDonald, while Hughes and Paul Logar each had a double.
Hughes said he previously pitched six innings against Western Reserve before seven on Monday, when he struck out eight.
Shaky start
In his first inning Monday, a fielding error, two hit batsmen, a walk and two wild pitches made for a shaky start.
"We had a simple error on the first hitter and, the next thing you know, it just snowballed," Williams said of Western Reserve's quick start.
Hughes said he had to buckle down.
"After getting behind, I knew we had to step up and get it done. I go out there and pitch my game and hope we come out with a win."
Hughes struck out eight in his team's third win over Western Reserve this season.
Four errors hurt Western Reserve, which ended its season.
"I don't think we came to the park very mentally tough today and it showed," coach Mike Kopachy said. "We were in the ballgame up until the end, but we just didn't step up and give a clutch performance like we have so many other times this year. We kind of reverted back to some of the silly things that we did earlier in the season."
Key inning
McDonald's big second inning made it 5-3.
"Having a rough second inning took us out of it, mentally," Kopachy said. "We got down and us as coaches and some of our leaders can only point in the right direction, but we've got to believe in ourselves and get it done and we just didn't."
Western Reserve entered the game having won eight of nine.
Drevna (4-2) left after 1 2/3 innings, giving way to Jared Barker.
Williams like the timing of the victory.
"I told the kids that it's time to get hot and play a good stretch of baseball," Williams said. "We played solid last week and have gotten off to good start this week."
Against Windham, which has won three district titles in a row, Williams would like to see a continuation of the offense.
"If we hit the ball like we did today, then you're going to be in the ballgame and score some runs. We're playing good defense and we tell our pitchers they're going to have good defense behind them and hope we put some runs on the board."
bassetti@vindy.com