Warren catcher Brandon Cline tags out Chillicothe base runner Aiden Scales at home plate on a throw from left fielder Jacob Stauffer in the third inning of Wednesday evening's Division III district quarterfinal at Don and Sue Schaly Field at Pioneer Park. Chillicothe downed the Warriors 10-5. (Photo by Mike Morrison)

With Wednesday’s Division III, District quarter-final being moved from Warren to Marietta due to the weather the Chillicothe Cavaliers got into town early enough to take advantage of the outstanding facilities including the batting cages at Don and Sue Schaly Stadium at Pioneer Park.

That extra time must have done wonders for the Cavs as they sent 13 batters to the plate in the opening inning alone, scoring seven times en route to a 10-5 win over the Warren Warriors.

No. 7 seeded Chillicothe pounded out nine hits in the opening inning as they chased Warren starting pitcher Jacob Sealey and put the No. 6 seed Warriors in a hole too big to overcome.

“It just seemed like whatever we were throwing up there they hit and hit hard,” said Warren head coach Chad Porter. “We weren’t able to minimize the damage there in the first inning and just dug ourselves too big of a hole to get out of.”

The Cavs wasted little time getting on the board as both lead-off batter Mason Brown and the number two batter Jackson Oyer stroked triples to give them a 1-0 lead.

Sealey fanned the next Chillicothe hitter but Trent McGlone singled to plate Oyer with the second run of the inning.

James Wrinkle flied out to left for the second Cavalier out of the inning before they strung together five consecutive base hits to bring Sealey’s day on the mound to an early finish.

Starting pitcher Trent Wade singled before Kayden Aftyka doubled to make it 3-0.

Catcher T.J. Barr singled in a pair of runners before third baseman Aiden Scales smacked a run-scoring double for the fourth extra base hit of the inning for the Cavs.

Brown kept the hit parade going by collecting another base hit leaving Porter no decision but to pull his ace Sealey from the mound in place of sophomore Tate Jonas.

Oyer greeted Jonas with the ninth hit of the inning for Chillicothe plating the seventh run.

After walking shortstop Vincent Haller, Jonas finally got the inning to end by getting McGlone to ground out to second base.

The Warriors came up empty in the first three innings off of Wade before finally starting to make some noise in the bottom of the fourth.

Catcher Brandon Cline got the inning started with a single and one out later moved to third on a hit by Jayce Hilverding.

The Warriors caught a bit of a break when Hilverding was picked off of first but kept himself alive long enough in the pickle to allow Cline to score with the first run of the game.

Hilverding managed to elude the tag as he was able to return safely back to first base.

One out later third baseman Al Winters singled before Jonas brought them both in with a triple to cut the lead to 7-3.

Oyer came on in relief of Wade to get the final out of the inning.

The Warriors took advantage of an error to add another run in the bottom of the fifth inning.

Sealey reached base on an error with one out in the inning and moved to second on a single by Cline.

Haiden Strong brought Sealey in with a sacrifice fly and just like that the Warriors found themselves down by only three runs.

“Our guys have played hard and battled all year so I wasn’t surprised they fought like they did,” said Porter. “We fought and fought and found ourselves in position to get back in it.”

Jonas did his job for certain on the mound as the right hander breezed through the next five innings allowing only one base hit and facing the minimum amount of Cavalier batters.

He was aided by a great defensive play when after Scales doubled with one out in the third inning and moved to third on a passed ball, Brown hit a fly ball to left field that Jacob Stauffer caught and fired a perfect strike to Cline who tagged out Scales at the plate for the final out of the inning.

Unfortunately Jonas may have ran out of gas in the top of the seventh when after he retired the first batter of the inning, the Cavaliers collected four consecutive base hits to score three back-breaking insurance runs to push the lead back to six.

Haller singled and McGlone doubled before Wrinkle tripled and Wade singled to bring an end to the evening for Jonas.

“It was a tough situation for him to come into because we didn’t expect that but he did an outstanding job,” said Porter of the effort from Jonas. ” We asked him to put up a bunch of zeroes and he did and kept us in the game.”

Haiden Strong came on in relief to get the final two outs of the inning but the Warriors found themselves in a six-run deficit heading to their last at-bat.

Stauffer led off the final inning with a hit and moved to third on Sealey’s double.

Two outs later Hilverding smacked an RBI single but the game came to a close on an outstanding diving catch in left field by McGlone to end the game and the Warriors season.

Chillicothe collected 14 hits in the game including at least one by all nine batters in the lineup.

The win improved the Cavaliers record to 9-14 and sends them to the District Semi-final on Tuesday against No. 1 seeded Jackson at Ohio University.

The Warriors season comes to a close with a 10-13 record.

The game marked the final one in Warrior blue for Cline and Sealey, the only two seniors on the Warren roster.

“Jake (Sealey) has been a four-year starter and Brandon’s (Cline) been a three-year starter and both of them are going on to play college baseball so we couldn’t be more proud of them,” said Porter. “It’s not easy being the only two seniors where everybody around you is basically a freshman or a sophomore but they did a good job of kind of holding things together and allowing us to be as competitive as possible.”

With nearly everybody eligible to return next year for the Warriors, Porter sees plenty of reason for optimism going forward.

“We started eight freshman and sophomores 23 times this year and one game we actually started nine,” said Porter. “We understood going into this season that it might be a bit of a roller coaster and it was but at times we played really good baseball so the future is really bright and we are excited for it.”