May 21, 2021 4 min read

WEST MIFFLIN – The Canon-McMillan baseball team could not have scripted a better start than the one it enjoyed Friday in the WPIAL Class 6A playoffs against section rival Upper St. Clair.

Any ending, however, would have been better than the gut-wrenching one the Big Macs suffered.

Upper St. Clair’s Hunter Schroeck hit a two-run, game-winning single through the left side of the infield with two outs in the bottom of the seventh to cap a three-run inning as Upper St. Clair stunned the Big Macs, 4-3, in a Class 6A first-round game at West Mifflin High School.

It was a shocking end for Canon-McMillan (8-10), which led almost the entire game and got six sterling innings from starting pitcher Tyler Greenleaf before he had to exit because of pitch-count limits.

“It’s heartbreaking,” Canon-McMillan coach Tim Bruzdewicz said. “To be up the whole game and lose, it’s deflating.”

Before USC took the air out of the Big Macs’ balloon in seventh, Canon-McMillan was flying high almost from the start. To illustrate how much the Big Macs controlled the game check out these numbers:

• There were only two pitches thrown in the game when Canon-McMillan did not hold the lead, and one of them resulted in the Big Macs taking a 1-0 advantage.
• There were no pitches thrown with Upper St. Clair (9-9) holding a lead.

Canon-McMillan took the lead only two pitches into the game when leadoff hitter Kolson Desocio drove a pitch from USC’s Brandon Liokareas over the fence in left field for a home run.

Liokareas had thrown a five-hit shutout in a regular-season win against Canon-McMillan, but this time the Big Macs had an excellent plan of attack. Early in the game, the Big Macs didn’t swing at Liokareas’ curveball and hunted his fastball. Noah Burke hit one for a one-out double in the first inning. Burke went 3-for-4 with two doubles.

With two outs, Mekos Mantalis reached on a throwing error, allowing the second run of the inning to score. Consecutive singles by Andrew Kocan and Mason Fixx scored Mantalis to make it 3-0.

Greenleaf, who struck out six and walked one, seemed to have more trouble keeping his cap on his head than dealing with the USC hitters for the first few innings. The Panthers were held hitless until third baseman Max Mandler hit a solo home run with two outs in the fourth to cut the gap to 3-1, the first sign of life for coach Jerry Malarkey’s team.

The key half-inning was the top of the fifth when Canon-Mac squandered a golden scoring opportunity. The Big Macs had runners on first and third with no outs after a Burke double and Nathan Vidmar’s single. Liokareas got out of the full-blown jam when Mantalis lined into a double play and Kocan grounded out.

“That was huge,” Bruzdewicz said. “You have to tip your cap to Jerry Malarkey. He’s one of the best coaches in WPIAL history. His teams never quit.

“It seemed like we were up 10-0 and it was only 3-0. The hits we needed never came.”

Greenleaf exited after six innings, having thrown 101 pitches. He was replaced by Brandon Adams, who had been so good for the Big Macs. How the bottom of the seventh unfolded was highly unlikely, especially after Adams struck out Timothy Speer to start the inning.

Mateo Capullio hit a one-out single, then both Owen Mandler and Jacob Casey were hit by pitches to load the bases. Jack Shearer then flied out to shallow right field for the inning’s second out, setting up Schroeck’s game-winning hit.

“This was tough because these guys have come up big in tight situations before,” Bruzdewicz said. “In the end, we just didn’t make enough plays.”