by Dan Lonky (@danlonky)
ONEONTA, NY — After a tough late-inning loss to the Silversmiths the previous night, the Oneonta Outlaws (23-15) bounced back and beat the Sherrill Silversmiths (16-22) 4-1 Saturday night in New York Collegiate Baseball League action.
For the Outlaws it was Malcolm Purdy (Grand Canyon) who led them from the mound, tossing 8.1 great innings while allowing only one run on six hits. Meanwhile, with the bats, the Outlaws were able to scatter four runs against Silversmiths starter Josh Webb (Utica), who threw all eight innings and allowed only five hits despite getting the loss.
“We tried to forget about last night’s loss, that was a tough loss for a lot reasons. These kids did a nice job bouncing back today, we got a real strong game out of Malcolm Purdy, and Brandon Stephens came in and closed the door and there was no comeback from them tonight,” said Oneonta Head Coach Joe Hughes of his team’s performance. “We played good defense tonight, made routine plays and kept our pitch count down with Malcolm who gave us a real good game.”
The Outlaws got their first run off Webb in the second inning on a Howard Joe (Mercer) sacrifice fly to center field, scoring Josh Treff (Northeastern). Oneonta then did the rest of their scoring in the fourth with some help from the Silversmiths poor defensive play. After Heath Holder (Georgia) was able to advance to third on an error, he then came in to score on a wild pitch from Webb. Mitch Hollander (Cortland) then kept it going with an RBI single up the middle. Joe then got back into the action later in the inning, stealing third and then scoring on the catcher’s overthrow into left field.
In the ninth inning was when Sherrill scored all four of their runs in last night’s game, and they tried their best to make things interesting once again in the ninth on Saturday.
Eyeing a complete-game win was Purdy, who came out for the ninth but was lifted after recording one out and allowing a double to Skyler Geissinger (Southern Illinois) and an infield single to last night’s hero Matt Ederle (Rhode Island). Coach Hughes decided to go with Brandon Stephens (Georgia) to try and shut the door on the Silversmiths. Stephens would do just that, as he struck out both Silversmiths he faced, got the save, and nailed down the 4-1 victory for Oneonta.
With the victory in their last home game of the regular season, the Outlaws once again find themselves tied for first place in the NYCBL standings with the Olean Oilers (21-13), who are only percentage-points ahead.
Oneonta will now look to finish the regular season strong and head into the playoffs on a high-note. They finish up with a doubleheader against the Salt Cats (19-16) in Syracuse on July 23rd, before looking forward to a possible championship run.
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