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Yellowjackets sink Ravenswood, 5-3

Williamstown’s Bradan Mullenix pitches during a high school baseball game against Ravenswood Wednesday in Williamstown. Photo by Steve Hemmelgarn.

WILLIAMSTOWN — Host Williamstown scored five runs in the first two innings before Ravenswood even got a hit and the Yellowjackets went on to notch their 11th straight baseball win Wednesday evening by a 5-3 score, becoming the initial West Virginia Class A team to down the Red Devils this season.

Bradan Mullenix (3-0) hurled 110 pitches over the first 6 2-3 innings for Williamstown, now 11-2, before Cullen Cutright came in to get the final out on a five-pitch strikeout with the potential tying runs on base.

For Ravenswood, now 13-2, the Red Devils’ only other loss came at the hands of Class AA Weir on April 14 by an 11-7 count.

The ‘Jackets jumped out to a quick 3-0 lead in their first at-bat. Bryce Haer led off with a double, Mason Adkins followed with a single and stole second to put runners at second and third. Mullenix grounded an RBI single through the hole into left field, another run scored on an infield throwing error and after a bloop single into right field by Ethan Tawney, Jarrett Masters hit into a fielder’s choice at second base to plate the third tally of the opening frame for Williamstown.

Two more runs in the second inning made it a 5-0 game. Evan Amos started it with a single, an unsuccessful fielder’s choice try at second base along with another throwing error and then a wild pitch put runners at second and third to set up Adkins’ two-run single to right field.

Ravenswood got going offensively in the top of the third. After a one-out walk, Nic Taylor’s infield single to deep short marked the Red Devils’ first hit of the game before a throwing error put runners at second and third, and Chase Swain drove them both in by grounding a single just out of the reach of the shortstop into left field.

The Red Devils made it 5-3 in the fourth on two errors and a wild pitch prior to Ciah Kennedy bouncing an RBI single right up the middle.

But then Mullenix didn’t give up a hit through the next two frames and until two outs into the top of the seventh when Blake Bennett beat out an infield single followed by a wild pitch and a walk. On came Cutright at ‘Jacket head coach Terry Smith’s behest and he finished off Ravenswood with a called third-strike fan job.

Despite Wednesday’s setback, Red Devil head coach Wes Swain was still pleased “with the way our kids never gave up and despite falling behind early, we were right there at the end.”

Swain added “that we’d be 13-2 now, we would have never dreamed that. But we’ve got to kind of refocus now with playing seven games this week.”

For Smith, whose teams always seem to improve as the season goes along, he gave credit to Mullenix, “who did a great job on the mound. I took him out because he wanted to finish, but I think I talked him out if it because I convinced him we didn’t want to give Chase Swain anything good to hit. So I talked him into that walk there, then brought in Cullen (Cutright) to finish.”

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