Wawasee’s Nate Hare dives in under the tag of East Noble’s Ben Tackett Monday in the season opener for the Warriors. (Photos by Nick Goralczyk)

SYRACUSE – After waiting nearly three weeks to play in a non-exhibition game, the Wawasee Warriors finally threw out the first pitch on their 2013 season Monday night in Syracuse. Unfortunately for Wawasee, the opening day excitement was ruined by a dominant pitching performance from visiting East Noble. The Knights struck the Warriors out five times, allowed only three hits and one run en route to a 10-1 victory.

A game that started out promising for a young an inexperienced Warrior squad would turn into a game that Wawasee would like to soon forget.

Senior pitchers Derrick Sorensen of Wawasee and Ryan McLaughlin of East Noble were the story for the first half of the night. Both pitchers held their respective opponents scoreless through the first two innings. The tie was not broken until Knights sophomore Marc Musselman crossed home plate with two outs in the top of the third after a throwing error at first base. East Noble carried the 1-0 lead into the bottom of the third where the Warriors would respond.

Junior Jordan Currie batted in the only run on the day for the Warriors with two outs in bottom half of the frame, scoring sophomore Brett Carson, knotting the game up at one run apiece. Both teams would miss an opportunity by stranding runners in the fourth inning.

Wawasee’s Andrew Milligan delivers a pitch.

The top of the fifth inning is where the game started to unravel for Sorensen and the Warriors. After facing four batters and only recording one out, Sorensen was relieved by junior southpaw Andrew Milligan. Sorensen struck out four batters in four and one-third innings pitched but would be charged with three earned runs and would take the loss for the Warriors.

Two batters after Sorensen left the field, East Noble junior Josh Tew singled, scoring two for the Knights. Tew would later score in the inning off of a hit from Ben Tackett. Wawasee would go down in order in the bottom frame and trail 4-1 going into the sixth.

The poor offensive showing in the bottom of the fifth inning was what first-year Warrior head coach Eric Screeton referred to as a tipping point in the game.

“They (East Noble) took a little bit of a lead there going up 4-1 in the fifth and I felt that was the tilting point,” Screeton said.

The coach would continue, “I feel like that type of situation is what is going to have to change for us to make a difference for this program. As we get better, do we respond from that 4-1 deficit? We did not have very good at bats that inning, we put up a zero and then East Noble extended the lead. I felt that if we could have found a way to scratch another run across with that score then maybe things would have changed for us.”

That inning was what stood out to the Warrior head coach but it was just the go-ahead at-bat itself that was a talking point for East Noble head coach Cory Jacquay.

“Josh came through for us in the fifth. He had a big two-run hit that really just blew the lid off of the game for us at that point. That was a big time swing from him,” stated Jacquay.

Not only did Tew provide the Knights with their game-winning RBI, but he also carried his weight on the defensive end by relieving McLaughlin and pitching three scoreless innings to close out the second win on the year for East Noble.

The Knights continued to swing away in the sixth inning, driving in three more runs to take a commanding 8-1 lead. In the bottom half of the inning the Warriors missed a chance to get back into the game as they left the bases loaded. Wawasee would leave a total of nine runners on base throughout the game.

The Knights would tack on two more insurance runs in the top of the seventh at the expense of sophomore Drew Anderson. Anderson struck out one batter in his short time on the mound, giving the Warriors nine strikeouts as a team for the game.

East Noble improves to 2-2 on the season while the Warriors fall to 0-1. Wawasee will play its next home game tonight against Whitko. First pitch is at approximately 5 p.m. in Syracuse.

East Noble’s baseball team reacts to happenings on field during its 10-1 win at Wawasee.