Courtesy of the Niagara Gazette
From Base Paths for March 19-24
By Doug Smith
Program pushers once upon a time cried, “You can’t tell the players without a scorecard.”
In the New York State Collegiate League’s Western Division this year, you can hardly tell the teams, either.
Only two true holdovers from ’11 dot the Power schedule that opens at newcomer Olean June 1, followed by a home opener June 2 at Sal Maglie Stadium. The schedule is unprecedently kind to the Bolts this year, a heavy load of weekend games and a majority of home games after school lets out.
Imaginative President-General Manager Cal Kern has added an international exhibition game early in the season and an exhibition road trip to the Eastern Division. There’s no inter-divisional play this year, probably a blessing with the price of gas rising to the area of Ted Williams’ 1941 batting average.
The Western Division (Base Paths urges naming it for founding father Dave Chamberlain) retains, sort of, six teams:
The Power, back for a sixth year;
Olean, brand-new, recruited by Kern, playing for this year, at least, at St. Bonaventure University;
Hornell, part of the establishment for more than a decade;
Wellsville, the former Allegany County Nitros, abandoning dusty and dim Scio High School and moving into a comfy natural-bowl behind a school in the village itself, but abandoning night games, at least for this year.
Now it starts to get tricky.
Geneva will have a team, the Yankees, in the Power’s division, but it’s basically the team that played last year in Webster and fled during the off-season, weary of fighting with local officials over footwear restrictions on the artificial field.
Webster will still have a team, though. Last year’s Alfred Thunder cast about for a lighted field and after several swings and misses, settled on Webster, the set up that last year’s team wanted no part of.
It gets weirder. The Geneva Red Wings, who knocked the Power out of the playoffs last July, have moved into the Eastern Division. Right, that’s two Geneva teams in the same league, one in each division. Looks like a long, difficult summer for McDonough Field’s already weary surface.
Except for two double-headers, all Power games have first pitch at 7 p.m. The home schedule, with other additional dates of note:
June 1 – Season opener at Olean, 5 p.m.; 2—Home opener vs. Geneva, 7 p.m.; 5-6 – Road exhibitions at Geneva Red Wings and Boonville; 7 – Burlington, ON, exhibition; 8 – Olean; 14 – Webster; 15 – Hornell; 16 – Hornell (2), 4 p.m.; 22 – Webster; 23 – Olean; 28 – Webster; 29 – Wellsville; 30 – Hornell.
July 3 – Geneva; 5 — Webster; 6 – Geneva; 11 – All-Star game, Sal Maglie, 7 p.m.; 14 – Wellsville (2), 4 p.m.; 18 – Webster; 19 – Geneva; 20 — Olean; 24 – Wellsville.
Let the weather continue and the games begin.
Signal back to Base Paths via pollyndoug@hotmail.com
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