MONROEVILLE – Having clinched at least a share of the Firelands Conference title on Saturday thanks to a win over Western Reserve and a simultaneous shock Monroeville loss to Crestview, Mapleton wanted to run the table to put an emphatic stamp on what would be the program’s first outright league title in two decades.
Monday night the Mounties had the opportunity to take one big step toward that goal but ultimately had the proverbial rug snatched from beneath their feet in a 6-4 loss to the Eagles for their first Firelands Conference loss of the season.
“Hopefully it’s a good learning experience and they learn that we can’t wait until the fifth inning to start hitting,” Mapleton coach Mike Leibolt said. “We’ll see how they bounce back … I think that’s going to be a good thing for us.”
For just the second time this season the Mounties were shutout in the first four innings of play, largely in part due to the stellar pitching from Monroeville’s Payton Weilnau who struck out 14 on the night.
“She has good movement,” Leibolt said. “Once we started to hit her, we hit it really well. We just came up a little short, they played better than us today.”
The Eagles jumped out to a 5-0 lead before Mapleton finally found a run in the fifth when Kendall Ramey (1-3, 1 RBI, 1 BB, 1 SB) drove in Aubree Hess (1-3, 1 R, 1 RBI, 2 SB). But Monroeville would immediately respond in the bottom and push the advantage back to five.
Mountie bats came alive in the sixth, though, nearly batting through the order after opening with back-to-back singles before scoring a trio of runs on a fielding error in centerfield then tacking on a fourth on a hard-hit Hess single through the second basemen’s legs. Mapleton would go on to strand runners on second and third to end the inning, then leave Audrey Hellickson (1-4, 1 SB) on second base to end the game in the seventh.
“We almost gave it away with errors,” Monroeville coach Pat Scheid said. “We knew they’re a good team … they’ve been hot all year and we’ve been up and down. We’re a good team, too, we’ve just had a couple gams where our youth showed — like tonight in the sixth inning — but we battled back and got done what we needed to do.”
While Monroeville can technically still share the league title with Mapleton, Scheid didn’t entertain the possibility much considering the Mounties end with a rescheduled game with a South Central team they beat 12-0 last week. The Eagles did, however, do the one thing they could control — spoiling the undefeated Firelands title.
“We’ve been in their shoes before and we’ve been on both ends of it,” he said. “We’ve won, and we’ve crapped down our leg before. It’s tough to be dominating like they’ve been dominating all year and sustain it, especially coming here against a good team. But they have a good coaching staff, they’ll be focused and ready to go tomorrow.”
Tuesday is a chance for the Mounties to clinch the Firelands outright with the return leg of the Monroeville series before closing out at South Central on Friday, a Division VI sectional championship against Wellington is sandwiched between on Wednesday.
“Our conference is always tough, there’s always good teams in it, so so you can’t ever go wrong knowing you’ve clinched the conference,” Leibolt said. “But obviously that wasn’t our goal … we’re looking to tomorrow.”
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This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Monroeville spoils Mapleton’s unblemished Firelands Conference season
Reporting by Zachary Holden, Mansfield News Journal / Mansfield News Journal
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