BEL AIR, Md.—The No. 4 Harford baseball team notched the first postseason victory in the history of the 40+ year-old program with a 4-2 victory over No. 5 CCBC-Dundalk in the Region XX Opening Round on Saturday at Harford Baseball Field. Sophomore Mike Krider (State College, Pa./State College) blasted the game-winning, two-run homer in the bottom of the seventh, while sophomore Joe Harbach (Abingdon, Md./Edgewood) was electric on the mound, striking out 15 in the complete-game effort. With the win over the Lions (23-25), the Fighting Owls (33-14) advance to the four-team, double-elimination regional finals next weekend at Catonsville, Md.
Krider's homer came with one out in the bottom of the seventh inning against Dundalk, who had advanced to the game with a 7-3 win over No. 8 Rappahannock earlier in the day. Sophomore Mike Maxwell (Salem, N.J./Woodstown) had led off the inning with a bloop single into left field. The blast, Krider's fourth of the year, went over the right field fence and untied the game, which had been knotted up on a solo homer by sophomore Willie Barnola (Barquisimeto, Venezuela/UEC J.G. Bastidas) in the fifth.
It was Harbach's pitching performance that had the crowd continually buzzing, however. The sophomore lefty got out of several early jams and gradually got stronger in his nine-inning outing. After allowing single runs in the second and third, he got into some trouble in the fourth with two runners in scoring position, and no outs, after a leadoff walk and double. Fortunately, Harbach rose to the occasion and induced a come-backer and a pair of strikeouts to end the inning.
Almost untouchable after that, Harbach did not allow another hit and the only subsequent Dundalk baserunners came on a walk in the sixth and an Owl error in the ninth. Twelve of the final 17 Lion outs were recorded on whiffs as Harbach improved to 4-3 on the season. The Dick Howser Award-nominee now has a 4-3 mound mark and 52 strikeouts in 45.1 innings pitched to go along with his .524 batting average.
Each team had scored in the second, on a pair of doubles—Harford's coming on two-baggers by Krider and freshman Eric Quinn (Pylesville, Md./Harford Christian). A two-out single and a stolen base in the next inning set the stage for Dundalk to regain the lead on an RBI single, 2-1, but Harbach's K's to get out of the second and third situation in the fourth allowed for the home run heroics by Barnola and Krider.
The Fighting Owls advance to the regional final-four at CCBC-Catonsville on Friday at 1:00 p.m. where they will meet top-seeded Frederick (47-4). Host Catonsville, the No. 2 seed, takes on No. 3 Allegany at 10:00 a.m. in the opening match-up that day. The Region XX champion from that field will be crowned on Sunday. That winner moves on to a best 2-of-3 district series at the Region XIX champion on May 21-23 with that survivor moving on to the NJCAA Division-II World Series in Enid, Oklahoma from May 30 to June 5.
