BASEBALL: Huron alone at top of SBC Bay

HURON — Paul Maloney needed just a moment to gather his thoughts. On the very next pitch after Edison pulled within a run with two outs in the seventh, the Huron junior induced a ground ball back to himself. He ran it all the way to first on his own, a big smile on his face. With that out, the Tigers had taken over sole possession of first in the SBC Bay Division. "I just had to step on the mound and believe I was better than the next kid," Maloney said. "I just had to keep throwing strikes and not let that affect me." The Chargers provided that late scare, but Huron never trailed in its 4-3 victory Wednesday night. The Tigers improved to 6-1 in Bay play (10-8 overall) with three to go, while Edison fell to 4-2 (11-3 overall). "That's the main goal this year, SBC championship is on our bucket list," Huron sophomore Landon Hohler said. "That's one of the many things we want to do, and it hasn't been accomplished too much around here, and we really want to change that this year." Huron, which fell 5-4 after losing a late lead earlier this season in Milan, again snagged the lead on Wednesday. The Tigers cooked up the ideal recipe — get the leadoff guy on, and get him in. They actually had their first two hitters reach in each of the first three innings. "The mindset we wanted to have was, you've got to hit to win, and I thought we did it," Huron coach Dan Lindsley said. In the first, Tommy Ray worked a walk, moved up on a Sam Cox single and came home on a strikeout wild pitch. Hohler led off the second with a single into left, and Ben Davis followed with an infield hit. That set up Donni Hartley to line a hit to left-center to bring in Hohler. "I haven't had my best at-bats recently, been struggling a little bit," Hartley said. "Going up to the plate, I knew I had to make something happen. Especially early in the game, we wanted to get out on top. It felt good." The third started the same way, with hits by Maloney and Austin Wasily. After an out, the left-handed Hohler went the other way again — this time a laced double over the left fielder to score Huron's pitcher and catcher for a 4-0 lead. "I really paid attention to the pitches in pregame and before going up to the plate ,and I really just sat back on the fastball and got a hold of it," Hohler said. A 4-0 edge was all Maloney needed. He had just two strikeouts, but his stuff missed barrels consistently. Seven times, Edison made an out within the first two pitches of an at-bat. "Paul did a great job throwing strikes," Lindsley said. "Had a few really quick innings early." Maloney had a no-hitter through four before Aiden Drake led off the fifth with a ringing double to left-center. Drake eventually scored on a Cole Leimeister infield single, but on that play, Huron found an out in a rundown between second and third to cut down the Chargers' hopes of a big inning. "We've got to be more mentally aware of the situation and what we need to do," Edison coach Sean Hoover said. "That's a big baserunning error, making the first out at third base after a couple hits." Edison made things interesting in the seventh. Drake reached on a one-out error, then with two outs, Leimeister lined a single to center. Abe Hermes scored them both with a double to deep left. "We did a nice job of trying to battle there at the end," Hoover said. That's when Maloney got the game-ending groundout to take sole control of first place. "That's what he does," Hartley said. "He reminds us, even when things aren't going that well, he's always the one turning around telling us to stay calm. That helps us." Remaining on Huron's league schedule are Margaretta (April 7), Port Clinton (April 9) and a trip to Vermilion (April 13). The Tigers put themselves in position by knocking off the back-to-back league champs. Now they've got a job to finish. "The message here was, 'Celebrate this, it's a big win against a really good program,'" Lindsley said. "But we've got work to do. The nice thing was, we didn't overcelebrate. I think the kids understand that and know that." Edison 000 010 2 — 3 5 0Huron 112 000 x — 4 8 2WP: Maloney. LP: Smith 2B: (E) Drake, Hermes; (H) Hohler