NORTH MANCHESTER - The season opener for the Wawasee Warriors and Manchester Squires had just about everything, except a winner.
After scoring four runs in both the first and second innings, the Warriors built their lead to 9-0 going into the fifth.
From there, Manchester scored nine runs in the bottom of the fifth, resulting in a 9-9 tie when it was deemed too dark to continue play at Manchester High School Thursday after the seventh inning.
"We told them we had to win every inning, and we didn't win that one inning," Wawasee coach Scott Blunk said, referring the Manchester's nine-run fifth. "We won every inning, but one, and that's what we're going to talk about."
Going into the fifth, Wawasee senior lefty Jake Goldenberg had surrendered just two hits and struck out seven, but he wasn't exactly mowing down the Squire hitters.
"Jake threw well, but he threw too many pitches," Blunk said.
Even in the fifth, Goldenberg began things by striking out Manchester senior Derrek Freshour and getting senior Matt Carver to ground out, putting two quick outs on the scoreboard.
However, from there, things fell apart.
Of their next eight batters, six Squires drew walks, with Goldenberg accounting for two, senior reliever Jose Rodriguez giving up two and fellow senior reliever Mike Milligan also walking two.
After all the walks, Manchester crawled to within 9-5 with the bases loaded for Carver.
Redeeming himself for his ground out earlier in the inning, Carver took a Milligan pitch just over the left-field fence, tying the game up at 9-9 on the grand slam.
"I'm just wanting us to do good things, like put the ball in play and swing at good pitches," Manchester coach Jack Rupley said about his mindset going into the inning. "It just so happened that Matt hit that ball, and it kind of snuck over the fence."
Making the pill even harder to swallow for Blunk was the fact that every run was unearned after an errant throw to first base scored Manchester's first two runs with two outs.
"We didn't make the little plays," Blunk said. "All we have to do is get the ball, throw it to first and we're out of the inning. We didn't do that."
And after scoring eight runs in the first two innings, it was hard for anyone to believe that Manchester would even escape the game without the 10-run mercy rule being implemented.
"We got ahead, then we just didn't get any hits," Blunk said. "We got some runners on, then we didn't stay aggressive. We've got to stay aggressive."
Through those first two innings, Wawasee did score its eight runs on just three hits, while Manchester starter Scott Baker struggled with his command.
"You can not defend walks," Rupley said of his team which walked a total of 11 Warriors, six from Baker in his 1-1/3 innings. "That's been the biggest thing we've been working on in preseason. We just said, 'Throw strikes, throw strikes, throw strikes,' because you can not defend the walks. Then, what do we do? We walk, walk, walk, walk."
Perhaps to equal the playing field, the Wawasee pitchers also did their fair sharing of walking batters, issuing nine free passes.
But while Manchester's walks came early, Wawasee's came from its bullpen, which walked seven batters in the final 2-1/3 innings.
For the Squires, it was junior reliever Clint Bischoff that really settled things down, entering the game to replace senior Nate Miller to start the fifth.
In his three innings of work, Bischoff gave up just one hit, but wasn't able to avoid the walking bug, issuing one free pass.
"Clint came in and just did a phenomenal job," Rupley said. "I talked to him, and said listen, 'Look at (Baker and Miller). They're not driving to the plate like we worked on, and they're not striding out.' I said, 'When your turn comes, you know what you have to do.' So, he came out and threw the ball pretty well."
Offensively, Manchester was led by Cody Semler's 3 for 5 night, but it was Carver that racked up the RBIs with his fifth-inning grand slam.
For Wawasee, junior Jake Sommers went 1 for 2 with three walks, two RBIs, two runs and a stolen base, while sophomore Josh Dingeldein delivered a two-run dinger in the first inning.
"I think they're pretty upset with themselves right now," Blunk said. "So maybe I can get something out of them."
As could be expected, the team that rallied from the 9-0 deficit wasn't as upset, but still took a lesson out of the game.
"We were down 9-0 and our heads began to nod down," Rupley said. "We addressed that tonight. We said, 'Hey, look, you can't do that. You have to stay in the game the whole game. And I quoted Yogi Berra's 'It's not over 'til it's over,'."
Manchester hosts Columbia City tonight at 5 p.m., while Wawasee doesn't take the field again until a doubleheader at Fairfield April 11, beginning at 9 a.m.
