By Gaylen Duskey
realfang@citlink.net
For John Persinger and his Calhoun Reds staff sometimes its two steps forward and three steps back as he tries to build a program from the ground up.
Sunday was one of those days as Parkersburg Catholic swept a doubleheader 12-2 and 15-2.
When Persinger took over the program it was a building process basically from the ground up.
His young baseball players needed to learn it all - how to throw, catch, field, hit - the proper way. And while tons of progress has been made a lot more needs to be made.
Unlike the first game of the season when the Reds lost a doubleheader at Clarksburg the problem was not having no clue as to what to do or what was expected. The problem Sunday was attention to small details and execution, especially when the Crusaders got runners on base where a walk was quite often as good as a triple as they stole at will.
The Crusaders' aggressive base running ended up costing the Reds an opportunity to get more players game experience as both games were closed out before the seven inning rule by the 10-run rule.
In MOVBL play all doubleheader games are scheduled for seven innings unless one team is ahead of the other by 10 runs earlier. As it turned out the first game went six innings and the second game four leading to lost opportunities to get more players more game experience.
So Sunday did the Calhoun Reds play well? Yes. But not often enough.
In the opener Parkersburg Catholic scored three times in the first by getting three runners on base with all three runners scoring without a hit thanks to its aggressive base running and a sacrifice fly to center field.
In the bottom of the first the Reds got two of those runs back. Allen Matheny led off with a single and walks to Caden Hicks and Seth Moore loaded the bases. Matheny and Hicks scored on a single by Austin Hicks but the rally ended there.
That was the last Calhoun would score as the Crusaders scored two in the third, four in the fifth and three in the sixth to put things away.
In the second game Calhoun scored a pair in the second. Austin Hicks led off with a single and went to third on a long double by Chandler Newell. Jerry Jones walked to load the bases and after a pair of strikeouts a walk to Ben Frederick scored the first run. Matheny walked to push the second run across before the threat ended.
Parkersburg Catholic scored one in the first. Seven in the second after a close call at first base all the Crusaders to keep batting. Had the call gone the other way the last five runs would not have scored at the score would have been 2-2 instead of 7-2 at the end of the inning.
The Crusaders added one more in the third before putting seven on the board in the fourth.
The Crusaders scored 15 runs on 11 hits in the second game.
The Reds go from the frying pan to the fire Tuesday as they play host to the Parkersburg Vipers Red, a feeder team for Parkersburg High School. Game time is 6 p.m.
First Game
Parkersburg Catholic 302 043 - 12 7 1
Calhoun Reds 200 000 - 2 4 6
Pitchers: Jerry Jones, Caden Hicks
Hitting: Allen Matheny 1-2; Austin Hicks 1-2; Jordan Basnett 1-2; Soney Wilson 1-2.
Second Game
Parkersburg Catholic 161 7 - 15 11 0
Calhoun Reds 020 0 - 2 3 3
Pitchers: Soney Wilson, Caden Hicks, Seth Moore.
Hitting: Austin Hicks 1-2; Chandler Newell 1-1 (2b); Chris Thornton 1-2.
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