Mercyhurst Prep uses solid pitching to return to the District 10 baseball title game
MEADVILLE – Mercyhurst Prep coach Randy Durkoske has plenty of confidence in his entire pitching staff, but scoring four runs early on let him put his plan into place.
“The way we play at Mercyhurst Prep, when we score four runs we win like 85 percent of the time,” Durkoske said. “It was big to get those early runs and build a lead.”
Once Mercyhurst scored its fourth run, Durkoske was confident enough to pull staff ace Hunter Krahe and save him for Monday as the Lakers beat Titusville 8-1 in the District 10 Class 3A baseball semifinals on Friday at Allegheny College.
The Lakers (18-4) will take on rival Fairview for the D-10 title at UPMC Park with their full complement of pitchers available.
Mercyhurst Prep, which is 53-6 (.898 winning percentage) over the past four years when scoring four runs in a game, put pressure on Titusville throughout the game with at least one runner in scoring position in five of six innings.
After leaving runners on second and third without scoring in the first inning, the Lakers took a 1-0 lead in the second inning. Josh Majczyk crushed a double to left, went to third on a sacrifice bunt and scored on a squeeze play.
Titusville responded in the top of the third inning on an RBI double by Kameron Mong, but Mercyhurst Prep put together a three-run rally in the bottom of the inning. Alex Manendo tripled to the left-center gap and the Lakers continued to pressure the Rockets. Zack Kruszewski was hit by a pitch, Noah Reigel walked to load the bases and Jack Stoker walked to make it 2-1.
Ethan Ishimaru lifted a sacrifice fly before Reigel scored on a wild pitch as Mercyhurst Prep took a 4-1 lead.
Krahe then left the game after 75 pitches, allowing him to pitch Monday. He struck out six and allowed just one run on five hits in 4⅔ innings.
“Building that lead was really big for momentum going our way and it paid off,” said Majczyk, who hit a second double later in the game. “Hunter is our best pitcher and it's great that we could save him.”
Noah Trojanowski, a John Carroll commit, then struck out three and allowed just one hit in 2⅓ innings to close the door and earn a save.
“It's great to have those two because they have contrasting styles,” said Durkoske. “Hunter throws a lot of fastballs and sliders and Noah is effective with his curveball.”
For Krahe, nothing changed except the situation with the season on the line.
“It was pretty much the same approach but with a little more pressure,” Krahe said. “We've dealt with that before though. It was huge to get a lead early because we preach getting on and scoring runs.”
Mercyhurst added two runs in the fifth inning on a Majczyk double before Kruszewski, who recently broke the school record in stolen bases with more than 28, had an RBI single and Reigel drove in a run with a double in the sixth inning.
Contact Tom Reisenweber at treisenweber@timesnews.com. Follow him on X @ETNreisenweber.
This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Mercyhurst uses solid pitching to beat Titusville in the D-10 playoffs
