Published: May 29, 2009 11:17 am      

Raiders rip Tigers

The Northridge Raiders had been waiting for this one since last season.

One year ago, the Warsaw Tigers ended Northridge’s baseball season 12-9 in the Class 4A baseball sectional at Elkhart Memorial.

The teams squared off again Thursday night with the Raiders winning, 9-2, in the opening round of play.

“Our kids really wanted this one,” Northridge coach Andrew Brabender said. “They felt like Warsaw ended our season early last year. We were fired up to play this one.”

The two schools had a rivalry this season as the Raiders and Tigers shared the Northern Lakes Conference championship.

“Today wasn’t our day,” Warsaw coach Mike Hepler said. “The breaks didn’t go our way. We hit the ball, but right at people. When you do that, and they make the plays, you have to give them the credit.”

Northridge (18-8) plays Saturday at 11 a.m. in the first semifinal. Concord and Goshen square off in the second around 1:30 p.m.

The championship is slated for Monday at 7 p.m.

Northridge scored three runs in the top of the second inning after Warsaw had plated two in the bottom of the first.

“We have eight seniors and six of them start. Our kids will never give up,” Brabender said.

The Raiders added two more in the fourth and basically put the game out of reach with three in the sixth and one more in the seventh,

Senior pitcher Cody Troyer was the beneficiary of all those runs. He scattered six hits to go with seven strikeouts and a walk in improving his record to 6-2.

“Cody has clearly been our No. 1 pitcher all season,” Brabender said. “He worked ahead in the count, kept the ball low and threw strikes.”

Senior Chase Byerly started for the Tigers before junior Josh Witt entered in the fourth. Byerly (7-2) was tagged with the loss.

“We didn’t know what to expect,” Brabender said. “We thought we would see Witt start the game.”

Hepler said, “Byerly had to throw about 40 pitches in the second inning and he was over 80 when I took him out. That was the difference in the game.”

Leading hitters for the Raiders were senior Dustin Petersen with a home run, sophomore Daimon Buck a double, two singles and two RBI; sophomore Garrett Yoder a double and two RBI, junior Gatlin Rassi a single, two sacrifice flies and two RBI, senior Luke Hofsommer and sophomore Cameron Nord run-scoring singles.

Petersen’s homer, his third of the season, made the score 8-2 in the sixth.

“He absolutely annihilated that pitch,” Brabender said. “It was good to see. He still has a football mentality. He has to get past his last at-bat.”

Warsaw finishes 19-8.