Season over? No way say Exeter Eagles, who rally for walk-off district baseball win
Justin Freese laid it on the line for his Exeter baseball team Monday afternoon. Down a run to Twin Valley heading to the bottom of the seventh the long-time Eagles coach let them know it was now or never.
“Guys, this is it,” Freese told the Eagles. “Your high school career ends today if we don’t score. It’s over.
If you want to continue to play baseball, you’ve gotta score a run here.”
The Eagles did better than that: They scored two.
For the second time this season Exeter use a late burst to beat Twin Valley, this time 3-2 in a District 3 Class 5A opener at Reiffton.
The fifth-seeded Eagles (16-6) trailed 1-0 before Owen Wisner tied the game with a sacrifice fly and Brady Hannahoe ended it with a sacrifice fly. Exeter had just one hit in the two-run rally — and just three for the entire game — but found a way to win it.
“Just being in the situations (like this) and knowing that we can come back and win late was a huge factor today,” said Freese. “It’s not like we didn’t do it all year long.”
Exeter beat the 12th-seeded Raiders (12-8) 2-1 in April at Reiffton. They came from six runs down on Senior Day to beat Central Dauphin — at that point the top-ranked Class 6A team in the district — 11-7.
Exeter trailed unbeaten Gov. Mifflin 6-2 after one inning and 9-5 after three before coming back to tie it with three runs in the seventh and six in the ninth to win it 16-10.
They nearly did something similar in the Berks League semifinals against Muhlenberg, rallying from a 10-3 deficit with four seventh-inning runs; they had the tying run on base in that one before falling 10-7.
Exeter has 11 seniors on its roster and that helps.
“These guys have played a lot of baseball over the years, they’ve played a lot of tournaments,” said Freese. “They believe in each other, they trust each other, they play together.”
Twin Valley went up 2-0 in the first on Paul Colombo’s two-run, bases-loaded single. After that, junior right-hander Deven Sheerin settled down. He ended up going 5 2/3 innings and striking out 12 before being removed in the sixth after reaching the PIAA pitch count limit.
“Deven struggled in the first inning, then after that he was phenomenal,” Freese said. “He ended up striking out six of his last eight batters, and I think the last five were all strikeouts.”
Senior Mike Greenawalt recorded the final four outs to pitch up the win.
Once again, Twin Valley right-hander Kannon Zdimal was superb. He allowed just two hits over the first six innings and went the distance, striking out eight. In the first meeting against Exeter he pitched five innings, allowing just three hits and one unearned run.
Exeter overcame a 1-0 deficit in that game, tying it in the fifth and scoring twice in the sixth to take the lead.
“Kannon’s a great pitcher,” Freese said. “He did a fantastic job today. Give him a lot of credit. He kept us off-balanced and he did a fantastic job.”
Evan Franek started the winning rally with a single. Pinch-hitter Jonathan Martin sacrificed, and the throw went to second. Franek’s slide broke up the play and knocked the ball loose; he was able to advance to third. After Martin stole second both runners advanced on Wisner’s fly ball to right.
The win was the first for Exeter in district play since 2016. It advances to meet fourth-seeded Ephrata (18-7) Thursday in a quarterfinal at War Memorial Field at 7. The Mounts advanced with a 5-2 win over 13th-seeded Waynesboro.