Holt and Spielman combine for no-hitter

Berkeley Springs got strong pitching and timely hitting in the consolation game of the Four State Border War Tournament to claim third place, with a 7-1 victory over Salisbury, Pa. on Friday, April 6, at Morgan Field.

Tyler Holt and Brady Spielman, the pitcher of record, combined for a no-hitter against Salisbury. Holt worked the first three innings, retiring all nine batters he faced, including three strike outs, while Spielman pitched the final four innings, allowing one unearned run on no hits. He struck out eight and walked two.

The Indians scored six runs in the first inning, one in the second, and then cruised to their sixth win of the year.

Scott Hessler led a 13-hit Berkeley Springs offense with a double, two singles and two RBIs. Brady Spielman had three singles, Kyle Appel had a single, double and two RBIs and Kaleb Athey had a run-scoring single.

"We were pretty disappointed in not being able to play for the championship in our own tournament, but we definitely didn't want to go 0-2," said Indian Coach Ron Bittinger. “The boys kept their aggressive approach at the plate and this time we were finding some holes against Salisbury. We scored seven runs in the first two innings and I thought we were in for a short game, but our bats went silent after the second inning and we didn't score another run. We didn't have any strikeouts in this game, so to only have one batter go down on strikes in two games is pretty impressive. I was a little disappointed that we couldn't put the game out of reach, but I'm pleased with the win."

Though the Indians were unable to end the game early, Bittinger was able to employ his intended pitching strategy.

"I had planned to start Tyler Holt regardless if we had a chance for first place or not," Bittinger said. “When we jumped out to a comfortable lead I put him on a really low pitch count. We face two sectional rivals next week, so I wanted to save his arm for Tuesday's game against Keyser. Tyler ended up being perfect in the three innings he worked and he ended up throwing only 25 pitches. I was able to get Brady Spielman some extended work. He's been struggling lately with his confidence and control, so it worked out pretty good. Brady looked like the ‘old Brady’ and I think he was able to make some adjustments this time out and get back on track. He ended up with eight strikeouts and didn't allow a hit."

Berkeley Springs lost their opening game of the tournament to eventual champion, Northern Garrett, 8-2, earlier on Friday.

Northern sent 11 batters to the plate in the opening inning and grabbed a 5-0 lead that Berkeley Springs could not overcome.

Jared Spielman started and was tagged with the loss. Spielman settled down after the first inning, striking out the side in the second and two more batters in the third, before being removed with bases loaded and one out in the fourth. Appel relieved Spielman and worked 1.2 innings, before Ryan Songer pitched the final inning of relief.

Berkeley Springs scored twice in the third to cut the deficit to 5-2. Kyle Appel led off with a walk and moved to third on a base hit by Athey. Appel would score on a stolen base by Athey and Athey scored the second run of the inning on a deep sacrifice fly off the bat of Jared Spielman. The Indians didn't threaten again until the top of the seventh, but the potential rally was snuffed out and the Huskies advanced to the title game against Warren County, Va.

While the Indian pitchers were struggling to find the strike zone, Northern's Jared Pike limited Berkeley Springs to just three hits, by Athey, Appel and Brady Crane, although there were a lot of hard shots hit right at players.

"I was pleased with our aggressiveness at the plate versus Northern," said Bittinger. “We put the ball in play everytime at bat except one. I keep telling the boys to make the defense work and we've been doing that as of late. Northern Garrett kept making the plays; some spectacular ones, too. Northern is a very good team and they always seem to put a good team on the field. They employed the same strategy against our pitching today. They scored five runs in the first inning by being aggressive and sitting on the Jared's (Spielman) fastball. The umpire was calling the strike zone pretty tight, so Jared kept falling behind in the count and was forced to throw a lot of fastballs. Unfortunately for us, they were finding the holes in our defense, while our batted balls were either right at somebody, or their defense made good plays. You have to give Northern Garrett and Coach (Phil Carr) credit."

Brady Spielman and Scott Hessler were named to the all-tournament team.

Northern Garrett defeated Warren County 18-11 in the high scoring title game.

Berkeley Springs had a makeup game at Frankfort on Monday, April 9 and played Keyser on Tuesday, April 10. The Tribe travels to Broadfording for a double- header on April 12 and to East Hardy for a single game on April 17.

Berkeley Springs is currently 6-8 on the year.

Stats thru Salisbury April 6
Batting average
Zane Mokhiber .316
Colten Ganoe .313
Jared Spielman .296
Brady Spielman .286
RBIs
Jared Spielman 11
Brady Spielman 6
Zane Mokhiber 5
Scott Hessler 5
Wins
Tyler Holt 3
Preston Hovermale 1
Brady Spielman 1
Jared Spielman 1
ERA
Tyler Holt 0.66
Preston Hovermale 1.78
Strikeouts
Tyler Holt 47
Preston Hovermale 28
Jared Spielman 20
Brady Spielman 13