Baseball Preview: North Schuylkill Spartans vs. Shikellamy Braves
North Schuylkill is 4-0 against Shikellamy since April of 2017, and they'll have a chance to extend that success on Monday. The North Schuylkill Spartans will look to defend their home field against the Shikellamy Braves at 4:30 p.m. North Schuylkill will be hoping to continue their three-game streak of scoring more runs each matchup than the last.
On Saturday, everything went North Schuylkill's way against Notre Dame-Green Pond as North Schuylkill made off with an 8-1 win.
Hunter Rogers made a splash while hitting and pitching. He looked comfortable on the mound, not allowing a single earned run over six innings pitched. Rogers was also solid in the batter's box, going 1-for-2 with a triple.
In other batting news, the team relied heavily on Colin Whalen, who went 1-for-3 with a home run. Peyton Groody was another key contributor, scoring two runs.
Meanwhile, Shikellamy was not able to break out of their rough patch on Friday as the team picked up their seventh straight defeat. They fell 7-2 to Central Mountain.
Like North Schuylkill, Shikellamy also got a great game from a two-way player: Mark Culp. On the mound, he didn't allow a single earned run while striking out six over six innings pitched. Culp has been nothing but reliable: he hasn't given up more than two walks in three consecutive pitching appearances. Culp was also big at the plate, scoring a run and stealing two bases while getting on base in three of his four plate appearances.
In other batting news, Kayden McClusky was cooking despite his team's loss, getting on base in three of his four plate appearances with a triple, a run, and an RBI.
Even though they lost, Shikellamy didn't let batters stay on the plate for long and finished the game with six strikeouts. This was only their tenth loss (out of 12 games) when they post five or more strikeouts.
North Schuylkill's victory bumped their record up to 10-7. As for Shikellamy, their loss dropped their record down to 2-13.
North Schuylkill beat Shikellamy 8-5 in their previous matchup back in May of 2023. One of the biggest obstacles trying to stand in the way of that victory was Shikellamy's Brayden Lytle, who pitched 4.1 innings while giving up just one earned (and five unearned) runs off six hits. Now that he won't be playing on Monday, will it be that much easier for North Schuylkill to walk away with another win? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
