Still Golden! Waynedale wins back-to-back state championships

AKRON — All postseason long, Waynedale relied on its offense.

It was no different Saturday night as the Golden Bears used an early offensive explosion in cruising to a 10-1 win over Harrison Central in the Division III state championship game at Canal Park, capping off a historic day of baseball for the area.

The state title is the second in a row for Waynedale, the first program in area history to accomplish the feat. Earlier in the day, Hiland beat Russia 14-4 in the Div. IV state championship game, leaving no doubt where the best small-school baseball in Ohio was played in 2023.

Unlike a year ago, however, when the Bears needed a game-winning hit off the bat of Connor Gatti, the lineup combined for 15 hits and looked comfortable at the plate all night long to win state title No. 2.

"It's indescribable," Gatti said, of winning a second state crown. "It's an honor, not many people get this feeling twice in their life. I really have no words."

Behind a dominant four-hit day at the plate from leadoff hitter Dylan Raber, eight of the Bears nine starters collected at least one hit as they touched up started Tucker Snyder early and often.

For Raber, a senior shortstop who finished the night 4-for-5 with three runs scored, he knew he needed to do something big after struggling in the batter's box in Friday's semifinal win over Ottawa Hills.

"After the semifinals, I knew I had to come back and do something for team," said Raber, who had one hit in the team's 6-2 win. "As the leadoff hitter, I knew I needed to hit the ball and get on base; that's what I knew I needed to do that and that's what I did. Just playing baseball."

That spark at the top of the lineup ignited a fire that the Huskies (20-13) struggled to put out.

Tristan Franks, Jayden Schlabach and Shane Coblentz each had a pair of hits in the victory as Waynedale stormed out to a 7-0 lead at two innings and never looked back.

After a regular season when the offense came and went, Waynedale's hitting was its calling card the entire postseason, as it outscored its opponents 38-6 during four regional and state games.

"Down the stretch here, when we got rolling, that's really what it took," Waynedale coach Lucas Daughtery said. "We needed our full lineup to get on base and do some damage, once runners get on.

"I'm not sure what it was, but we're definitely glad it happened when it did."

After a quick one-run lead after the first, thanks to a hit by Trey Barkman that resulted in a fielder’s choice that allowed Raber to score, the Golden Bears (24-9) opened the game up in the second.

Franks and Conner Gatti strung together two-run hits — a single by Franks and a double by Gatti — followed by Timmy Short blasting a double to left to plate another and Schlabach finishing the barrage with an RBI double of his own.

The inning forced Snyder out of the game after the right-hander struck out to just one and allowed six runs on five hits in facing just 12 batters in a 1⅓ innings of work.

“Once we got a couple of runs across, we relaxed and, when we're like that, we usually hit the ball better,” Daugherty said. “I really think it's just confidence. It took a little while for us to get it figured out at the plate, but once we did the confidence spread throughout the team.”

Short added to it with a sacrifice fly scoring a run in the third, followed by an RBI single from Coblentz in the fourth and a sac fly off the bat of Barkman in the fifth to spark another celebration on the downtown Akron field.

“It's surreal,” Franks said. “We played a crazy game and I think everybody had a lot of fun, bats were rolling, it was a great night baseball.”

Waynedale didn’t leave anything to chance on defense, led by another sterling performance from junior lefty Otto Solorzano on the mound.

Solorzano fanned seven hitters over six innings of work, allowing just one walk and one run, before Short slammed the door in the seventh by fanning two of the three batters he faced. Solorzano has been the winning pitcher in two state title games, and still has another season of high school baseball to go.

The defense behind Solorzano made key plays all night long, too, as Spitler fielded a ball in the first and then dove to the back of the bag for an out to force Harrison Central to strand a runner, with other guys making incredible plays in bunches. Like Raber catching a rocket at shortstop, or Coblentz playing a rebounded ball off second base to throw a guy out and Short making a shoestring catch to take away a hit late in the game.

One of the best defensive plays of the night came from the often-overlooked backup defense of Franks, as the catcher raced to back up first base on a routine ground ball, only to see that ball sail over Spitler’s head, resulting in Franks throwing the runner out at second.

“That's what I'm taught,” Franks said. “Hey, I got their backs, and they got my back, so I'm going to be there.

“It was just one of those things that you're always there, in case something happens, and something happened.”

It was plays like that, on both the offensive and defensive ends, that helped the team to an historic finish to the best two-year stretch for any area baseball team.

It’s something that Bears and their seven seniors will never forget.

“It's incredible,” Raber said. “This team here, it's a little bit different from last year, but it's the same bond. It's incredible to come back here with these guys and it feels amazing. Really emotional for us, especially for the seniors, we weren't ready for this.

“But when we got back here, we knew we needed to do it.”

This article originally appeared on The Daily Record: Baseball: Waynedale beats Harrison Central for Div. III state title