Dave Mackall stories, Page 12

FISHERTOWN, Pa. — Southmoreland’s bats remained virtually silent in the postseason for a second time in a row Monday, and the Scotties’ softball season ended with a 4-1 loss to Chestnut Ridge in a PIAA Class 3A first-round game. Chestnut Ridge (17-3), champion of District 5, moves on to play...

Neshannock’s dizzying 46th consecutive softball victory Thursday turned out to be such a special one. And, oh, don’t the Lancers know it. Earning back-to-back WPIAL championships with a 12-2 rout of crosstown rival Laurel in the Class 2A final at PennWest California’s Lilley Field was enough to set off a...

Union softball coach Doug Fisher wasn’t about to dwell on the unpleasant elements of his team’s 10-8 victory over Carmichaels, giving the Scotties their second consecutive WPIAL Class A championship. Instead, he wanted to savor the end result. Top-seeded Union (17-3) overcame an early four-run deficit, sidestepped six errors and...

The stage appeared a bit too bright Tuesday night for top-seeded Latrobe at the WPIAL Class 2A boys volleyball semifinals, and No. 4 North Catholic could sense it. The Trojans took control of the best-of-five match early, putting the Wildcats on their heels and seizing a 3-0 victory at Gateway...

Bishop Canevin and Leechburg, two high-scoring Class A baseball teams, found the runs hard to come by Monday in their WPIAL quarterfinals game at Highlands, but No. 6 Canevin managed to score more. Kole Olszewski limited No. 3 Leechburg to three hits, and Bishop Canevin’s defense shined as the Crusaders...

Late Friday afternoon, SHU Baseball Complex on the campus of Seton Hill went eerily silent shortly after Mercyhurst stunned the 13th-ranked Griffins baseball team with a walk-off grand slam to send Seton Hill into the losers’ bracket at the NCAA Division II Atlantic Region II Tournament. It meant the Griffins...

Survive to play another day. Seton Hill on Saturday shook off a devastating loss a day earlier to Mercyhurst and remained alive in the NCAA Division II baseball playoffs with a 10-4 rout of East Stroudsburg at the Atlantic Region tournament at SHU Baseball Complex in Greensburg. The Griffins (46-11),...

As gut-wrenching losses go on a 1-to-10 scale, this one was a 10. “I know the character of our team, but we’ve never experienced a loss like this on this stage in this season,” Seton Hill coach Marc Marizzaldi said Friday, moments after Mercyhurst’s Luke Jackson hit a walk-off grand...

Riverview entered the WPIAL baseball playoffs as an unheralded No. 10 seed, but the Raiders had their ace lefty on the mound in the first round Thursday against No. 7 Charleroi. That’s usually a recipe for success. Enzo Lio pitched 5 2/3 effective innings before reaching the 100-pitch count limit...

Section rivals Valley and Burrell got together again Tuesday night for another baseball encounter, but the stakes were much higher this time in a preliminary-round WPIAL Class 3A playoff game at Highlands. While Valley came up short against its neighbors from Burrell in both regular-season Section 3 games, the Vikings...

On a day before the Seton Hill softball team was to learn the outcome of a potential return trip to the NCAA Division II Tournament, coach Cassie Moore and her fiance were continuing their restoration project of a 100-year-old house situated in the apple orchards region near Follansbee, W.Va. The...

Gateway’s first WPIAL team tennis championship in 35 years sparked a merry post-match celebration Wednesday on the lower courts at Washington & Jefferson’s Janet L. Swanson Tennis Center. Players, coaches and fans mingled amid a chaotic chatter. “I’m so excited,” Gateway coach Emily Levine shouted. “Hey, ‘Let’s Go, Gators,’ right?...

There weren’t many hits by either baseball team Tuesday, but there were enough errors made by one to provide plenty of baserunners for the other. Freeport was happy to oblige. The Yellowjackets took advantage of some sloppy defense by East Allegheny in the opener of a two-game, home-and-home series to...

Penn-Trafford continues to play through the pain. The Warriors baseball team Monday lost another key player to an injury — its fourth this season — but went on to its third consecutive victory and seventh in the past eight games, beating Franklin Regional, 7-5, at Murrysville’s Haymaker Park, and delaying...

Like mother, like daughter? Or something like that. Lexie Hames has picked up where her mother, Marlesse Hames, left off. Or something like that. “She’s 10 times better than me. She’s a better athlete than I was, for sure,” Seneca Valley softball coach Marlesse Hames said of her daughter, sophomore...

The Riverview baseball team ended a string of 13 scoreless innings, sending nine batters to the plate during a four-run fourth that sparked a 7-0 victory Monday at Ligonier Valley. Raiders left-hander Enzo Lio limited the Rams to two hits and one walk while striking out 11 as Riverview (7-3,...

Boys volleyball practices at Hempfield this season have been like nothing Owen Kelley has seen in his four-year association with the Spartans program. “We have 13 guys that see varsity time, which is a full second team,” Kelley said. “In the past, the varsity would practice against the (junior varsity)...

It hardly seems fair that the Frazier softball team, a state championship contender for years in Class 2A, was reassigned this season to the Class A level. The Commodores have demolished their past six opponents by an average of 14 runs after opening the season with a loss to Class...

Jim Schall has coached in some intense and high-quality high school volleyball settings during his considerable time on the bench, but he ranked Thursday night’s Penn-Trafford-Hempfield match right up with the best of them. Schall’s Penn-Trafford Warriors came away with a 3-1 home victory that was tougher than it appeared....

The Burrell baseball team is rolling along, despite coach Mark Spohn’s occasional declarations of despair. “We looked better today than we did the last time out,” he said. “We had a couple (of mistakes) where we didn’t get some runs in. Those are things we’ll go over.” Nevermind that the...

Minutes after exiting the court following Latrobe’s 3-2 loss to Hempfield, Drew Vosefski flashed a smile at a well-wisher. “It’s early,” the Latrobe boys volleyball coach said over the noise of fans disbursing from the Latrobe High School gymnasium. In a battle of neighboring rivals with a history of ultra-competitive...

Whether Freeport’s Michael Hanz will keep making a jump or eventually flame out is a common question for potential phenom baseball pitchers. After all, Hanz is one of those rare young fellows whose fastball touches the upper-80s and who is capable of consistently throwing the rest of his arsenal for...

Baserunning miscues, walks galore, a period of moderate rain and perhaps, surprisingly, no errors made for a quirky but typical March baseball game in Western Pennsylvania. In the end, visiting Burrell on Monday came away with a 7-2 victory over neighboring Valley in a renewal of their WPIAL rivalry in...

All along the main drag, as usual, business carried on in the village of Russellton. Shoppers headed in and out of the Deer Lakes Plaza, near the Russellton Fields soccer complex. Down the way, a man refueled his car at Trocki’s Service. Beyond there, at Tatoni’s Restaurant and Ale House,...

If ever an adage was suited for Class A athletics, bet on the old “we-wear-many-hats” proverb. Just ask Union girls basketball coach Rob Nogay what goes into creating a successful season at Pennsylvania’s smallest high school level. Generally, with limited resources, the multi-tasking never ends. “I got this job four...