ONTARIO — For Kyle Walters and his Ontario teammates, approach was everything.
Walters had three hits and drove in three runs and the Warriors rallied for an 11-5 win over Clear Fork in Mid-Ohio Athletic Conference action on a blustery Tuesday afternoon at Ontario High School.
“The last couple games I didn’t do too good with my approach. I didn’t come up (to the plate) and have the mindset of I’m going to hit this ball every single time,” Walters said. “We had a talk on Monday about having a good approach coming up the same way every single time and that’s what I did. I hit the ball and got on base.”
Ontario (7-6, 4-1) struck for three runs on just one hit, an Owen Hatfield single, in the bottom of the first. The Warriors took advantage of a Clear Fork error and a wild pitch and Walters lifted a sacrifice fly to center to plate Gage Weaver.
Clear Fork (5-8, 2-3) pulled even in the top of the second without hitting a ball out of the infield. Ontario committed a pair of errors and the Colts got a run-scoring fielder’s choice off the bat of Ethan Staley and scored another run on Jared Scott’s infield single.
The Colts added unearned runs in the third and fourth to open a 5-3 lead before the Warriors came to life in the home half of the fourth. Ontario scored five runs on just a pair of hits and a Clear Fork error. Colten Ramion had a two-run double in the inning while Walters had an RBI-single.
Walters doubled and scored on Ryan Brophy’s single in the fifth and knocked in another run with a single in the sixth.
“I felt there were innings where we could have stopped the bleeding,” Clear Fork coach Joe Staab said. “We’ve just got to make the next play and that’s what we consistently don’t do when we’re on the losing end.”
Scott started on the mound for the Colts but lasted just one inning. The right-hander was hit by a pitch on his pitching hand in his first at-bat in the top of the first and couldn’t get a feel for his pitches in the chilly air as his hand began to swell. He was lifted in favor of left-hander Brock Talbott.
“(Scott) got hit in his first at-bat right on his throwing hand and he was having trouble feeling the ball,” Staab said. “We went to Talbott, who did a great job for us. He had one rough inning and they capitalized on it, which is Ontario’s MO.”
Ryan Chapman started and worked the first two innings for the Warriors. He was lifted in favor of lefty Caden Armstrong, who worked the final five innings for the win.
“We’re really excited that he’s healthy, he’s confident, he wants the ball and he wants to finish strong,” Ontario coach Jeff Fisher said of Armstrong. “The other side of the coin is, building confidence on the mound he’s wired that it connects to the plate, too.
“He’s kind of got off to a slow start but now there’s some spark there.”
Ontario is alone atop the MOAC standings midway through the season.
“Once this team learns how to not carry their failures to the plate or defensively, we’ll improve,” Fisher said. “I think you saw a little of it today. It was really flat early despite us having a good first inning.
“We just didn’t have the gumption to take that ballgame away from them.”
