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Dominion Post
7 days ago
- Sport
- Dominion Post
CHARLESTON HUSTLE: Morgantown High sweeps Wheeling Park for trip to state tournament
MORGANTOWN — It's a three-hour drive from Morgantown to Charleston. The Morgantown High School baseball team might choose to walk instead. MHS used nine walks, timely hitting and a dazzling pitching performance to beat visiting Wheeling Park 7-3 on Thursday in the second game of the Class AAAA Regional Championship series. With the win, the Mohigans (26-10) make their second-straight trip to the state tournament hosted at GoMart Ballpark in Charleston. 'Obviously, we were able to take advantage of some things they gave us,' MHS head coach Pat Sherald said. 'We were really fortunate to be able to put up seven runs in that situation.' After loading the bases in the first inning and watching the Patriots (23-12) wiggle out of that situation, the Mohigans sent nine batters to the plate in the second. Walks played a big part in a three-run inning for MHS as it drew five walks in the frame. Senior Weston Mazey provided the big hit in the inning as he hit a two-run double to left field that snuck just pat the out-stretched glove of the Wheeling Park outfielder. Mazey later scored on a wild pitch to give MHS a 3-0 lead. 'In that situation, I am just trying to get a ball in the air to score a run,' Mazey said. 'I got one in the air, and it ended up dropping and getting away (into the corner) so that was nice to score those two runs.' The Patriots, who finished the game with five hits to MHS' three, tied the game in the top of the third inning. Kolten Whitmire had an RBI single while Jaxon Updegraff added an RBI sacrifice fly and Whitmire scored when Nate Simon reached base on an error. 'We tied the game in the top of the third and we had our chances,' WP head coach Steve Myers said. 'We put guys on for free and that is never a good recipe.' MHS took the lead right back in the third inning as Mazey once again provided the offense with an RBI sacrifice fly to left field. Ryan Nipper scored later in the inning when Mason Bowers reached base on an error for a 5-3 lead. The Mohigans finished their scoring in the fifth inning as Koa Silvers hit a sacrifice fly that scored Mazey and then Nipper scored as Bowers reached base on another error. Wheeling Park committed three errors in the game with two of those coming on what should have been the third out of the inning. While the Wheeling Park pitchers were struggling to find the strike zone, MHS starter Maddox Boggs had no problems. Boggs pitched all seven innings with four strikeouts, five hits allowed and just three walks. 'Maddox really went out and competed for us,' Sherald said of his sophomore pitcher. 'He held a really good team to three runs, and I am just really proud of his effort. He maintains composure, competes and three strikes for us.' This is the first time in school history that the Mohigans have made the state tournament in back-to-back seasons. MHS will play a yet to be determined opponent on Friday in the Class AAAA semifinals. — Story by Eric Herter Morgantown 7, Wheeling Park 3WP 003 000 0 – 3 5 3 MHS 032 020 X – 7 3 2
Dominion Post
29-05-2025
- Sport
- Dominion Post
Morgantown High takes first game over Wheeling Park, now one win shy of states
WHEELING – Wednesday was Game 1 of the Class AAAA Region I Championship, but it was far from the first encounter between the Morgantown High and Wheeling Park baseball teams. In the fourth encounter between the two teams this season, the Mohigans earned a 5-3 road victory at Patriot Field, a win which puts them in the driver's seat in the best-of-three series with a state tournament on the line. 'Wheeling Park's a very good baseball club, their pitcher did a great job pitching,' Morgantown head coach Patrick Sherald said. 'They hit some balls hard, we were fortunate. Our pitcher on the bump, Vincent Aloi, pitched a really quality game for us. We played good defense. Offensively, we had to scrape together some runs, put some pressure on, lay some bunts down, generate situations where we were fortunately able to score some runs. Happy to get out of here with a win against a good team, it'll be a battle tomorrow– it seems like these games have always been battles the last couple years.' The Patriots and Mohigans traded runs back and forth across the first four innings of Wednesday's meeting– Wheeling Park scored in the first and the fourth, Morgantown scored in the first and the third– before Morgantown broke the 2-2 tie with three runs in the sixth inning. The Patriots would put across one run, and get the tying run up to the plate, but fall short of a comeback. Wheeling Park committed three errors on Wednesday, including a couple of mistakes in the sixth which aided the Mohigans' cause. 'Little bit self-inflicted,' Wheeling Park head coach Steve Myers said of the loss. 'We need to be better in those pressure situations. We had a good approach. It's baseball, sometimes it doesn't go your way. It's a three-game series so we'll be ready to go tomorrow.' Morgantown laid down lots of bunts Wednesday, including a run-scoring sacrifice bunt in the third inning, and a bunt which led to a fielding error– and a run– in the pivotal sixth frame. With no outs in the top of the sixth, Mason Bowers stood on second for the Mohigans. Koa Silvers laid a sacrifice bunt down the third base line, but upon retrieval the throw to first was in the turf and got by the first baseman, allowing Bowers, already on his way to third base, to round the bag and get across home plate. Vincent Aloi hit a sacrifice fly later in the inning to put Morgantown ahead 4-2. Jackson Bredeson came home on a called balk to score the third run of the inning. A two-out, two-strike single up the middle by Jaxson Updegraff in the bottom of the seventh scored Kolten Whitmire for the Patriots, with senior shortstop Nate Simon coming up next to represent the tying run at the plate, but a hard-luck lineout straight to third base ended the game. 'Our two-strike approach was very good today,' Sherald said. 'We were able to hit some balls hard. In the end though, it was us putting pressure on them in the bunting game and taking some extra bags. We're fortunate today and we look forward to tomorrow.' Aloi picked up the win for Morgantown, striking out two and walking just one in a complete game. Aloi was able to manage runners on the basepaths and avoid the big mistake in limiting the Patriots. Whitmire pitched the whole game for Park, striking out three and allowing only three hits. There were more defensive highlights than offensive ones on Wednesday. Wheeling Park's Ryland Robb had a standout day at third base, including converting a pair of impressive 5-3 putouts in the fifth. Robb made all three outs in the inning, but his final two were what had Park's dugout fired up by inning's end. With one out, Robb charged a weakly hit ground ball, fielding the ball cleanly and making a quick throw to first for an out. Then, with two down, Robb had to react quickly to a hard shot skipping down the third base line, diving to one side to field the ball, before getting to one knee and firing a strike across the diamond to end the inning. Bowers made a big throw from centerfield for the Mohigans in the bottom of the sixth. With nobody out and a Patriot on second base, Robb cracked a base hit to shallow centerfield, and the runner from second was waved around third towards home. Bowers delivered a strong throw that went on a line to catcher Samuel Watson, who applied the tag at home plate to deny Wheeling Park a run. — Story by Nick Henthorn
Dominion Post
27-05-2025
- Sport
- Dominion Post
Morgantown set to battle Wheeling Park in Region I baseball championship series
MORGANTOWN – The Morgantown High School baseball team will meet Wheeling Park in the Class AAAA Region I championship series this week, with the winner earning the right to represent Region I next weekend in the 2025 WVSSAC state baseball tournament in Charleston. The two sides have met three times this season, with Wheeling Park taking two of the three contests. The Patriots won both regular-season matchups by one run before MHS took the OVAC 5A title game 4-2. Wheeling Park will host Game 1 on Tuesday. Game 2 will move to Dale Miller Field at Mylan Park in Morgantown with a decisive Game 3 heading back to Wheeling, if needed. 'We've been working on fundamentals and making sure we are ready to do what we do best,' MHS head coach Pat Sherald said. 'In this series, you're going to see two talented baseball teams go head-to-head and battle. We had three close games against them already this season. They're a well-coached club who pitch well and are strong defensively. But I like our team as well and I think we're going into the week prepared and focused on the task at hand.' In the three games the two sides played this season, the Patriots had success at the plate, earning more hits than MHS in all three contests. Particularly, the bottom half of the Wheeling Park lineup. 'They can hurt you all through their lineup,' Sherald said. 'They had a few guys have some very strong games against us and we've been able to see some tendencies. But for us we just need to worry about controlling what we can control and putting the blinders on to achieve our goal.' One thing that may benefit the Mohigans this week is their pitching rotation of Vinnie Aloi, Maddox Boggs, and Lucas Shinn. The trio has combined for a record of 15-3 this season and each have an ERA under three runs while throwing more than 35 innings. Aloi and Boggs have each thrown 30 strikeouts as well. Closer Judd Messerly has three saves in as many attempts this season. 'I think that benefits us in a best-of-three,' Sherald said. 'I really like where those three are right now and hopefully they continue throwing strong and throwing strikes. We got some good innings for them against Bridgeport and Fairmont Senior this week in preparation and we will be ready to go come Tuesday evening.' Morgantown and Wheeling Park begin the Region I championship series Tuesday at 5:00 p.m. in Wheeling. Game 2 will be at 5:30 p.m. in Morgantown on Wednesday.
Dominion Post
02-05-2025
- Sport
- Dominion Post
Morgantown High girls' tennis team captures OVAC championship
GLEN DALE – The fourth – and final – day of the OVAC tennis tournament provided some new faces atop the leaderboard at the sun-filled, but wind-swept courts at John Marshall High School. In the 'Small School,' Class 1A-4A division, Oak Glen ended Linsly's 13-year dominance as it nipped the Cadets, 11-10. In the 'Big School' Class 5A race, Morgantown won for the 10th time in the 12 years with a 25-19 triumph over Wheeling Park. Defending champion University was a close third at 17. While the Mohigans captured three of the four singles titles, Wheeling Park's Madeline Bradshaw won the other. The Patriots top-seeded junior prevailed at No. 1 with an 8-0 blanking of Morgantown's No. 2 seed Maya Greenlee in quick fashion. 'It finally feels good to get over the hump. I've been in the finals a couple of times but never won until today,' Bradshaw said. 'I think the wind kind of helped me. I think I played a pretty consistent game that helped me get through the match. 'I felt my serve was pretty good today and I was able to put away some shots,' she added. 'That's what you have to do at this level.' The win was also Bradshaw's 100th of her career. Morgantown won at No. 2, No. 3 and No. 4 as top-seeded Natalia Cassim defeated Wheeling Park's No. 3 seeded Harper Moores 8-6; No. 1 Annika Chadha topped Wheeling Park's Reese Moores, 8-2; and No. 1 seed Annabell Goodkoontz downed University's third-seeded Hannah Stemple, 8-3. The Golden Bears didn't have a finalist, and only had one semifinalist in Reese Witherow, but, according to veteran head coach Kenneth Keller, 'used a total team effort' in securing the top hardware. This was absolutely a total team effort. Everybody contributed in some way,' Keller noted. 'I'm very pleased. We have a very young team with only one senior. We have four sophomores and a freshman in the starting lineup.' Reese Witherow advanced to the semifinals at No. 4 singles but fell to University's Hannah Stemple in a hard-fought, 9-7, match. Other members of the Oak Glen team are Leah McMahon, Elle Monaco, Zoey Caughey, Ruby Chaney and Roxye Brown. 'It's very exciting to finally win the title,' Keller said. 'I've got plenty of OVAC runner up plaques at the school, so this feels very good.' The Carol Strasser Sportsmanship Award was presented to St. Clairsville's Makayla Hancock. Team scoring was as follows: BIG SCHOOL 1. Morgantown 25; 2. Wheeling Park 19; 3. University 17; 4. Parkersburg South 4 SMALL SCHOOL 1. Oak Glen 11; 2. Linsly 10; 3. Weir 9; 4. Indian Creek 4; 5. Steubenville Catholic 3; 6. Wheeling Central 2; 7. St. Clairsville 1 — Story by Kim North
Dominion Post
01-05-2025
- Sport
- Dominion Post
MHS girls take early lead in OVAC tennis championships
GLEN DALE – The OVAC tennis tournament returned to the John Marshall courts on Wednesday for Day 3 under sun-filled skies with action in girls' doubles. The event concludes Thursday with action in girls' singles. University and Linsly are the defending 'Big School' and 'Small School' champions. All three doubles titles reside in Morgantown, as the Mohigans won at No. 1 and No. 2, while University took No. 3. As a result, Morgantown finished with 10 points, which was two better than Wheeling Park and University. Oak Glen leads Linsly, 6-4, in the 'small school' race. At No. 1, the second-seeded duo of Maya Greenlee and Annika Chadha defeated the No. 1 Wheeling Park tandem of Madeline Bradshaw and Lauren Eskins by an 8-3 count. Both teams advanced with 8-0 quarterfinal victories before Morgantown prevailed 8-3 in its semifinal and Wheeling Park 8-2. At No. 2, Morgantown's No. 1 seeded pairing of Natalia Cassim and Annabelle Goodykoontz topped Wheeling Park's second-seeded sister duo of Harper and Reese Moores, 8-0. The Mohigans won 8-2 in the quarters and 8-0 in the semifinals. The Patriots prevailed 8-0 and 8-6, respectively. At No. 3, the Hawks' No. 2 tandem of Vanessa Wiesinger and Izzy Ringler held off Oak Glen's fourth-seeded team of Roxye Brown and Zoey Caughey. Both teams had to battle their way to the finals as Brown/Caughey won 8-1 in the quarterfinals before upsetting top-seeded Morgantown (8-5) in the semis. University won 8-3 and 8-5 to reach the finals. John Marshall's Akwasi Braun was the Carol Strasser Sportsmanship Award winner on the boys side. The girls winner will be announced following Thursday's action. Team scoring is as follows: BIG SCHOOL 1. Morgantown 10; 2. (tie) Wheeling Park, University 8; 4. Parkersburg South 1 SMALL SCHOOL 1. Oak Glen 6; 2. Linsly 4; 3. Weir 3; 4. (tie) Indian Creek, Wheeling Central 2; 6. Steubenville Catholic 1 — Story by Kim North
