Woodstown sophomore delivers big hit, earns three-inning save to lead Wolverines past Pennsville in SJ Group I playoffs; Maple Shade upsets top-seed Schalick

SJ GROUP I SEMIFINALS
Woodstown 6, Pennsville 3
Maple Shade 6, Schalick 4

By Al Muskewitz
Riverview Sports News

WOODSTOWN — Marc DeCastro and all his Woodstown teammates know the kind of hard-core competitor Walker Battavio is, but what the sophomore showed Wednesday took it to another level.

Battavio delivering a three-run double to give the Wolverines the upper hand in their 6-3 win over Pennsville in the South Jersey Group 1 baseball semifinals was impressive enough. What he did in the late innings — and what he had to endure to do it — approached legendary status.

He came in from centerfield with a three-run lead and earned a three-inning save. What made it even more courageous was he pitched the last two innings with cramps in his right leg that made every pitch painful.

But he endured and because he was bulldog-tough the Wolverines (20-8) are playing for the SJ Group 1 title for the fourth time in the last six years. They host Maple Shade Friday. The fourth-seeded Wildcats spoiled the anticipated 1-2 Salem County championship showdown when they upset top-seeded Schalick 6-4.

Battavio helped the Wolverines uphold their end in a big way in his longest outing since April 18.

“He has one of the biggest hearts in the game; he’s a dog,” said sophomore first baseman Blake Rodriguez, who gave his classmate a four-run cushion with his first career home run leading off the sixth inning. “He always puts his team first. He’s not a selfish guy. Unselfish person. He’ll do anything for the team. Puts his heart on the line.”

Battavio had been prone to cramping and Wednesday’s hot conditions didn’t make it any easier. The cramp really hit in the fifth inning when he ran the bases after putting the Eagles down in order in his first inning on the mound in the top of the inning. He came in there because starter Drew Sutton had thrown 27 pitches the previous inning and was started to go through the Pennsville lineup a third time.

He could feel the knot forming in his leg as he was stealing second base but continued on to the bag and when he got there safely was on the ground in pain. He received attention from the training staff and remained in the game, eventually scoring on Ty Coblentz’ RBI single that got Pennsville starter Gavin Spears out of the game. He spent the rest of the game drinking his hydration water and enduring the pain.

“Nothing’s bringing me out of the game,” Battavio said. “My mindset is playing no matter what.”

And DeCastro didn’t want to take him out, which meant he had to help push his pitcher through the pain.

“I worry about him cramping up every time I have to bring him in late because he gives every ounce of himself to everything he does; he exerts so much energy that at the end of games he has to fight through exhaustion,” the head coach said. “There’s no way he threw one pitch that didn’t hurt and he tried to fight as hard as he possibly could and he got through it, so he did everything he needed to do.”

Battavio admitted cramping every time he threw a pitch – and he threw 52 of them — but he just tried to forget about it and focus on getting the next hitter.

“It was pretty hard, but I’ve got that dog, so I’ve gotta fight through it,” he said. “I felt it every pitch, but I dug deep and knew I had to get it done for our team so I just did it. Gotta do it. I knew I could do it and I just persevered through everything.”

The last two innings were sort of messy for Battavio, but he wound up allowing four hits, two runs and striking out one. The inning after he cramped on the basepaths, the Eagles reached him for three hits to score a run and loaded the bases with two outs, but he prevented it from becoming a big inning by getting the final out on pop to second.

The Eagles (16-10) also got a run off Sutton in the fourth inning and left the bases loaded there, too. They scored their third run in the seventh inning, but ran themselves out of another potential bases-loaded situation on the play that netted their run.

I feel like we beat ourselves today, I really do,” Pennsville coach Matt Karr said. “We had the bases loaded early, we’re right where we want to be, (and) back-to-back hits there it’s probably a tie game. … Haddon Twp. we dug ourselves a hole (but rallied to win). It’s hard to keep climbing out of these game. Today we spot them a 4-0 lead and were trying to climb out of this hole the entire game. It’s hard to play that way.”

The Wolverines got those first four runs in the second inning. Rodriguez drove the first run home when Spears’ threw high to the plate on his squeeze bunt. That left two on with one out. Noah Williams drew a walk to load the bases then Walker hit an opposite-field double just out of the reach of left-fielder Steve Fatcher to clear the bases. 

As the leadoff man in the Wolverines’ lineup, it was only the second time in his last 10 games he drove in a run. The last time he had an RBI, he drove in four against Penns Grove.

“I saw the opportunity,” Battavio said. “They were playing up on me. They didn’t think I could hit it that far, so I had to show them what I can do, and I did it.”

“The reason that got over his head is because he’s a leadoff guy and he hit it the other way and they were playing him a little bit shallower to get anything in front of them,” DeCastro said. “He’s a strong kid. Hasn’t always known how to use his strength. He’s always been a little guy. A lot of times a little guy (is encouraged to) put a ball in play and run, so he got used to that. Now he’s becoming a man he’s strong and he’s learning not just to put a ball in play but drive balls in gaps.”

Pennsville	000	101	1-	3	6	2
Woodstown	040	011	x-	6	7	0

Mistakes costly to Schalick

PITTSGROVE – Schalick had been a pretty good defensive team this season and even when it wasn’t the Cougars had the offensive firepower to overcome it. That wasn’t the case Wednesday and they the post-season price.

The top-seeded Cougars were charged with five errors and every time it seemed their opponent made them pay. It added up to a 6-4 Maple Shade win that ended Schalick’s season and sent the Wildcats to face Woodstown for the South Jersey Group 1 title Friday.

“We didn’t play very well,” Schalick coach Sean O’Brien said. “The funny thing is we turned three double plays, but then other routine things we just made mistakes. And when we made mistakes they blooped in a hit or they got a single here or there. They just made us pay for our mistakes.”

Early on it looked like the Cougars were headed for the 1-2 Salem County showdown for the sectional title with Woodstown everyone anticipated. They broke a 1-1 tie with three in the third inning on Evan Glaspey’s two-run double and Travis Snodgrass’ sacrifice fly.

Then things started going south. The Cougars were late deciding where to go with a ball back to the box and all runners were safe. A grounder to the right side of the infield moved the runners up and Edward Leahy delivered a two-run single to center to cut Schalick’s lead to 4-3. The Wildcats took the lead on back-to-back RBI singles by Lucas Voiro and Anthony Schafer. They added another run on Aaron Wells’ RBI single in the seventh. Schafer had three hits and three RBIs and Leahy went 2-for-3 with two RBIs.

Maple Shade’s first five runs were all unearned.

The Cougars, meanwhile, managed only two hits and a walk after opening their 4-1 lead. The two hits were back-to-back singles by Bo Schalick and Glaspey with two outs in the fifth. They had the top of the order up in the seventh, but Wildcats reliever Braydon Morgano got through it with a two-out walk and three flyouts.

“They’re a tough team; they made us pay for our mistakes,” O’Brien said. “Their pitchers, all they did was pitch to contact and we had a lot of fly outs.

“We struck out twice the entire game. All (Morgano) did was he just pitched to contact. A lot of balls we hit in the gap just kind of stayed up in the air and they were able to run underneath them. He didn’t do anything spectacular, he just did his job. He did a good job of forcing us to make outs.”

The loss ended an otherwise big year for the Cougars. They finished 19-8, won 10 of their last 13, won the TCC Diamond Division for the second year in a row, and were the No. 1 seed in the sectional. Seniors Evan Sepers (105) and Ricky Watt (102) both collected their 100th career hits. 

“We had a great season, there’s really nothing to be disappointed about,” O’Brien said. “When you don’t reach your goals at the end it’s a letdown because we know we potentially could have done it. Unfortunately in the playoffs if you don’t have your best game and don’t do what you need to do as you get deeper in the playoffs good teams will just make you pay.”

Maple Shade	010	202	1-	6	8	0
Schalick	103	000	0-	4	7	5

GROUP I SECTIONAL FINALS
Friday’s games
(Records, power points in parenthesis)
SOUTH: Maple Shade (16-9, 21.490) at Woodstown (20-8, 23.697)
CENTRAL: Shore (21-8, 27.805) at Pt. Pleasant Beach (17-6, 28.914)
NORTH I: Waldwick (16-13, 23.307) at Pompton Lakes (20-7, 25.319)
NORTH II: Hanover Park (18-8, 24.783) at Cedar Grove (19-9, 25.754)
Power points to determine home team in state semifinals