By Lori Chase
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@LChase_RA
St. Bonaventure, NY — Monday night, Olean Oilers coach Bobby Bell talked about the need for “timely hitting.”
On Tuesday, the Oilers proved his point.
Putting multiple runners on base in all but three innings, Olean pounded out 13 hits against Wellsville pitching in a 7-4 victory, leaving the Nitros still seeking their first win of the season in the New York Collegiate Baseball League’s Western Division.
“Like I tell these guys all the time – we’re going to hit the ball, we’re going to win a lot of games. We’ve just got to have a little bit of timely hitting,” Bell said. “When we string them together we’re going to score a lot of runs, and that’s what we did today.”
Jon Kemmer led the Oil boom with a pair of RBI doubles, finishing the game 3-for-3 and reaching base safely on all five of his plate appearances. The left fielder also thwarted a Nitros scoring opportunity in the fifth inning, turning and sprinting after a long fly ball with a runner on second, then making the catch for the third out as he slid into the fence.
“We shook up the lineup a little bit,” Bell said. “The last couple games we’ve had him in the three-hole; we moved him up into the two-hole hoping we could get a couple more opportunities for him. He took full advantage of the two-hole and hit the hell out of the ball.”
“It felt good,” said Kemmer, who led Clarion with a .387 average and cracked five home runs during his just-completed junior season with the Golden Eagles, of his big day at the plate. “With runners getting on base in front of me and the guys behind me protecting me – that’s the big thing, I’ve got three great bats in a row right behind me. That gives me better pitching right in front of them.”
Olean also got a strong performance from starter Mike Tolsma, who went two outs deep into the seventh inning before giving way to the bullpen, notching four strikeouts and issuing one walk while allowing seven hits and three earned runs.
“Mike’s a smart kid. He helps a lot of pitchers on the team when he’s not pitching,” Bell said. “That’s all I told him today – ‘Use what you tell everyone off the field. Make sure you’re using that on the field today.’ He definitely did that. He went out there and did a great job for us.”
One of four Erie Community College Kats on the Oilers roster, the 6-foot-5 southpaw from Tonawanda found the strike zone on 63 of 92 pitches, including 16 first-pitch strikes against the 27 batters he faced.
“That’s basically the key to the game – get ahead, stay ahead, and force ground-ball outs,” he said. “The defense did a great job today.”
Olean jumped out in front early, with shortstop Joe Pantano drilling a leadoff single off Wellsville pitcher T.J. Hunt’s glove, then racing home on Kemmer’s standup double to the fence in left field. After Brad Rush’s grounder to short moved Kemmer over, he scored on Mike Scarcello’s infield single to give the Oilers a 2-0 lead after the first frame.
Wellsville didn’t take long to answer. Designated hitter Chris May led off the top of the second by launching a shot over the Atlantic 10 logo on the left-field fence at Fred Handler Park for his second home run of the season, and catcher Chandler Sidwell followed with a one-out double into the right-field corner.
It looked like the Oilers would get away without further damage, but a dropped third strike for the third out proved costly when Sidwell, who moved to third on the play, came home on the front end of a double steal to tie the game 2-2 before Tolsma recorded his third strikeout of the inning to retire the side.
Olean got one back in the bottom of the inning, with Kemmer’s ground-rule double over the fence in right plating his Clarion teammate, designated hitter Joe Chittester. After that, both pitchers settled into their rhythm, and the score remained 3-2 Olean through the end of the fifth.
The Nitros would pull even again in the sixth, when Nick Fornaca’s long sacrifice fly to right scored left fielder Michael Fries, who had led off the inning with a double and moved to third on a passed ball. But as they had earlier in the game, the Oilers responded, going back in front to stay with two runs in their half of the inning and adding another pair in the seventh.
“That’s having the killer instinct,” Nitros coach Frank Jagoda told the Wellsville Daily Reporter. “Olean, over there, they have that killer instinct. It’s about being able to come back or get up when you’re down and step back when you’re stepped on. We need to be able to find it within ourselves to develop that killer instinct. Once we score one, we need to score two and then three and four. Then once we have a lead we need to tack on. It’s early and we’ll develop that.”
The Oilers bullpen turned in another strong outing, with Garrett Stockton coming on to close the door in the seventh, then working a scoreless eighth before closer Cody Petre pitched the ninth to record the save.
Pantano (2-4), Scarcello (2-4, RBI), Chittester (2-3, RBI), and catcher Michael Booth (2-3, RBI) all joined Kemmer with multiple hits for the Oilers, while Fries (2-4) and Pete Strommen (2-4, double) did the same for the Nitros.
Olean (2-1) is back in action tonight against the Geneva Twins, whom the Oilers defeated 3-2 on Sunday for their inaugural NYCBL victory, with the first pitch at Geneva’s McDonough Park slated for 7 p.m. Wellsville (0-3) is off until Thursday, when the Nitros head north to Webster to face Athletes In Action.
At St. Bonaventure:
Nitros 0 2 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 – 4 8 1
Oilers 2 1 0 0 0 2 2 0 X – 7 13 1
Hunt (5.1 IP, 4 SO, 0 BB, 5 ER), Johnson (6), Fishman (6)(BB), Silvestri (7)(1 SO), Gautieri (7)(1 BB) and Sidwell
Tolsma (6.2 IP, 4 SO, 1 BB, 3 ER), Lee (7)(1 BB), Stockton (7)(3 SO), Petre (9)(1 BB) and Booth
HR: May (W)
HBP: Booth, Scarcello, Kemmer (O)
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