Around the horn 2025
Cranberry notches 3rd straight D-9 softball crown
File photo by Kelly Malek
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Sophomore Gracee Hess fired a four-hitter as Cranberry blanked Redbank Valley, 6-0, Monday for its third straight District 9 2A softball title.
Hess didn't walk a batter and struck out nine as the 16-4 Berries claimed their sixth district crown overall.
Hess gave up a rocket to the first batter of the game, but left fielder Ashlyn McWilliams gunned her down trying to stretch the hit into a triple.
Hess was dominant after that.
Meanwhile, Danica Wenner, McWilliams and Lexi Reisinger backed her effort with home runs.
But it was a ringing double by Jadyn Shumaker and an RBI single by Hess in the second inning that would give the Berries all the runs they would need.
They continued to add on, anyway. McWilliams hit a two-run homer in the third after an RBI single by Scarbrough.
Wenner and Reisinger later added solo shots.
Cranberry now moves on to interdistricts with the Berries hosting the WPIAL runnerup Monday.
The opponent will be either top-seeded Neshannock or second-seeded Chartiers Houston. Those two will play for the WPIAL title at 2:15 p.m. Thursday at Penn West California. Neshannock is defending state champion.
​Cranberry lost to Laurel -- a neighbor of Neshannock -- in the first round of interdistricts last season. The score was 4-1.
In 2023, the Berries outlasted an old basketball rival from their glory days, Greensburg Central Catholic, 8-7, before being eliminated by 24-0 Everett out of District 5, the eventual state champion.​
Guth picks up W as Vandy beats Ole Miss for SEC tourney title
Franklin's Luke Guth got the win Sunday in the SEC tournament championship game, a 3-2 Vanderbilt victory over Ole Miss.
With the Commodores up 2-1 with two outs in the fifth and the tying run on third, Guth was called on in relief of starting pitcher Austin Nye. Guth escaped the jam as the next Ole Miss batter flied out to right.
Guth finished his stint with two walks and two strikeouts in 1.2 scoreless innings.
The sophomore right-hander's updated stats for the season: 19 appearances, 19.1 IP, 9 hits, 7/22 W/K, 0.93 ERA. 4-0 record and opponents are hitting .141 against him.
Vandy (42-16) received an automatic berth to the NCAA tournament and was awarded top seed for the Nashville Regional (May 30-June 2). The Dores (as they're called down South) will face No. 4 seed Wright State (38-19) in their first game. The No. 2 seed is Louisville (35-21) and the third seed is East Tennessee State (41-15).
The Nashville regional is paired with the Hattiesburg regional; the winners of the two regionals will meet in a super regional. (June 6-9).
The Commodores will be making their 19th straight appearance in the NCAA tourney, longest active streak in the nation. They'll be seeking their first regional crown since 2021, when they last played in the College World Series. Vandy won it all in 2014 and 2019, and also went to the CWS in 2011 and 2015. This year's Series is from June 13-23.
The SEC championship was the program's fifth, and the fourth under current coach Tim Corbin. Vandy has claimed three of the last six --- in 2019, 2023 and this season. At one point this season, Vandy was 8-7.
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District 10 championships
Monday's Results
Baseball
1A -- West Middlesex 1, Cochranton 0
2A -- Mercyhurst 6, Greenville 0
3A -- Titusville 8, Fairview 3
4A -- Cathedral Prep 8, Harbor Creek 2
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Softball
1A -- Cambridge Springs 12, West Middlesex 0
2A -- Seneca 14, Sharpsville 5
3A -- Sharon 5, Northwestern 1
4A -- Harbor Creek 2, Ft. LeBoeuf 1
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District 9 championship
Softball
2A -- Cranberry 6, Redbank Valley 0
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Blurbs
Franklin's Jay Prettyman signed a letter-of-intent to continue his running/academic career at Memphis (the basketball school). Prettyman's older brother, Caleb, is a freshman at Penn State where he is listed on the cross country roster. The Prettymans have given Franklin a powerful 1-2 punch in the distance races for the past five years. Jay added to his resume by running a meet record 9:42.06 at the Redbank Valley Invitational on May 8. (Photo here by Christy Fackler).
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Oil City's Jackson Dilks (photo here by Kelly Malek) reached the D-10 semifinals where he lost to eventual three-time champion Gavin Ferretti of Cathedral Prep. Jaxon Klapec and Carter O'Dell beat a team from Titusville May 8 to advance to the quarterfinals of the D-10 doubles tournament before losing.
Saw in the paper where erstwhile star wrestler Dane Wenner of Cranberry is class valedictorian and headed to Penn State where he plans to major in electrical engineering. In addition to his many accomplishments in wrestling and track (school record 13-7 pole vault last year), Wenner is a four-time state qualifier in cross country and golf. Didn't realize that. The salutatorian is none other than Kayla Hanna, one of the stars of the state championship cross country team. She's plans to attend Slippery Rock where she will be in the accelerated physician assistant program -- with a minor in Spanish.​
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Will McMahon has signed a letter to attend Penn State-Behrend. Last fall it was announced that he was going there for golf, now it's baseball......Nikki Petro, a jumper on the Oil City girls track team, is headed to Mercyhurst, according to a "tweet"" on X. The university launched its Division I track program (for both men and women) in November.​
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Roman McFall, former Oil City High School football/basketball prospect whose family moved away after his freshman year, received the outstanding male athlete award at Canyon High, a 6A school in New Braunfels, Texas. He also received the coveted Spirit of Canyon award, which is given at the end of the night.
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The Cranberry Super Berry logo finished in the top eight in the country and the top four in its region in a recent contest. The Berry eventually lost out to the Hampton, Va., Crabbers. And to think about 40 years ago the school was thinking about changing its nickname from the Berries -- to the Cougars or something if memory serves.
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Ben Webber, an Oil City High School graduate who has been at ESPN since 2000, won another sports Emmy May 20, this time for his work on College Game Day (Rece Davis, Lee Corso and those guys). Webber is a coordinating producer at ESPN. He's a Westminster College graduate who starred in swimming in high school and before that was a fixture in the Oil City Little League, if not on the field then in the press box. Webber was the subject of this excellent feature story by John Dudley in the Erie Times News in 2017.
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Track Leftover: So, now that the state track meet is over, it can be said that Oil City faced two state champions in opponents' backfields during the 2024 football season. Nolan Carey of Corry, who threw for 234 yards and three touchdowns in a 26-21 decision against the Oilers, won the 2A javelin, and sophomore Vinny Feliciano of Mercyhurst, who scored on an 83-yard run after the Oilers were comfortably ahead, won the 100. Feliciano was 18/120 and caught a 55-yard TD pass. One of Carey's TD passes went to another state champ, hurdler Blake Cook.
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Track Leftover II: Central Clarion (a Clarion/Clarion-Limestone co/op) not only won the 2A state title 400 relay, but earned medals in the other two, taking sixth in the 1600 and eighth in the 3200. Heralded QB Jase Ferguson who plays hoops for C-L in the winter, went out for track this spring and ran the second leg of the sprint relay. And one of the runners on that relay is a freshman.
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Things gleaned from reading X (mainly Tom Reisenweber, who keeps track): D-10 baseball title for Titusville was first for Rockets...Back-to-back softball titles and 11 in all for Cambridge Springs (Rocky Grove gave Spa better game in the semis)...Harbor Creek has seven softball titles...Mercyhurst eight-time winner in baseball...
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Football 2025
Three months to go...
(Photos by Richard Sayer)