That is not why they won Monday, but it is motivation. 

With Nathan's family in the stands, the team huddle before the game started and as they broke they yelled, "Family."

History won't say that Rocky Grove's win over Saegertown Monday was a triumph of baseball, but it was a bit of heart at times, guts at other times and... yes some sloppy ball. There cannot be enough sugar coating to change the fact that this game was long, a lot of pitches were thrown and not very many of them hit the strike zone.
​The officiating at times caused some head scratching too.

Saegertown looked solid for the first couple innings. Punching away and striking pay dirt. They were up three runs and Rocky Grove seemed to struggle getting solid aluminum on the leather. 

Then, in the fourth, they erased Saegertown's lead and added one. Saegertown responded to tie, but the Grove was anything but done. They added three more in the fifth and then six in the sixth. It looked like the game was in the bag.

​Not.

Saegertown scored four in the bottom of the sixth. Rocky Grove Coach Sanner told his team in a huddle before the start of the final inning that they shouldn't rest on their lead and go out to score more runs.  They managed to add one more.

Saegertown looked like they were going to go out quietly with two quick outs, but that last out was mighty tough to come by. Saegertown scored four and had the winning run on base when a grounder to short was fielded well and tossed to second to end the three-and-a-half-hour seven-inning game.

​Rocky Grove, the fourth seed, advances to take on Kennedy Catholic who defeated Cochranton earlier in the day.

Congrats Franklin, what a ride you're taking this community on this year.
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Members of the Franklin softball pose for a photo with the District 10 Championship trophy following Franklin's 3-0 win over Villa Maria at Penn State Behrend on Monday.

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A tenacious softball squad that was given a 6th seed entering the playoffs is now headed to the championship game on Monday. Hickory scored firs in the meeting at Slippery Rock University,  but Franklin was able to counter and go up one late only to be tied at the end. Several times Hickory seemed destined to win, but the Knight's tightened their belts and played smart, heads up ball.
Hickory's two runs came on errant throws to pick off runners at third
Franklin scored a third run in the extra inning with gutsy running and a timely hit.
​Then they just played with patience in the bottom half of the extra inning to stop Hickory from scoring again.

Across the road at Slippery Rock, the baseball team was also getting ready to take on Slippery Rock. The star pitcher got them to this point with a big win earlier in the week, but their other top pitcher had a hand injury and wasn't able to play. As a result they struggled against a good Hickory squad. When pitching was good, the fielding was sloppy. Hickory took advantage of everything.

Below please see more photos from both games down in Slippery Rock. Plus there were some interesting bird encounters and a third game I squeezed in a couple shots.

Five set matches used to be fairly common for me to cover in all my years at the Meadville Tribune. Volleyball is considerably bigger in Crawford County than Venango and boys volleyball is virtually non-existent in Venango. Only Rocky Grove field a team and they seem to struggle reaching that next level of play. I have thoroughly enjoyed photography Rocky Grove because I love making images of effort and caring.

Tonight, however, I was asked to photograph the Cochranton versus Saegertown match up in the playoffs for my old paper The Meadville Tribune. This was high end, punch counter punch, knock down drag out volleyball. There were momentum swings and come from behinds. It was what I remembered from the almost two decades covering volleyball every fall and spring.

​Below is a slideshow of tonight's action.

About a week ago Franklin pitcher Trinity Edge took a hard liner back to the mound square in the leg. It buckled her and she ended up being carried off the field. Not something you want to see as playoff season begins.

But there she was today at Allegheny College throwing heat from the mound.

The sixth seeded Franklin squad came to play today against the third seed Warren. Franklin jumped out to a one nothing lead but then stalled stranding a few runners. Warren's first at bat was almost identical to Franklin. Lead off batter bunts and a bad throw lets the runner go on to second and eventually scores. 

​1-1 after one.

Then nothing happened in the second inning. The third inning Franklin gain a run on sacrifice fly and Warren countered by plating two runners to go up 3-2. The fourth inning was also uneventful.

Franklin then had a big fifth. A Triple followed by a single tied the game and then Trinity Edge stepped up an put one over the fence. A spectator yelled out that at least she doesn't have to run hard for this one.

This put Franklin up 5-3.

In the sixth Warren threatened and plated one runner with another in scoring position. On a squib hit the runner tried to score on a bobble ball at first but was gunned down and the catcher held on despite the collision. This ended up being the deciding factor in the game as Edge shut Warren down in the final inning.

Franklin advances and will play Thursday at a site and time to be determined.

​Below are more moment from Franklin's big win.

Edge also tripled in the game where she went full out running, but paid the price. Despite the obvious pain she was in, she came out in the seventh and finished off Warren who left a runner at second.

Luke Guth faced 22 batters in seven innings of work, that is a near perfect game. Oh, there were a couple hits and and a walk, but no Sharon toes crossed the plate. Only one ball that left his hand from the mound made it into the outfield on the fly. That was caught acrobatically in right field. Everything else stayed in the infield  of Slippery Rock's fancy new turf stadium.

Guth had Sharon batters buffaloed all night. Weak swings were common and only about three solid bats hit the hard ball. But all three ended up in a Franklin mitt.

​"I got to hand it to that kid," one spectator from the Sharon side of the stadium uttered as he left the field. He was talking about Guth.

Here are my notes from the game. Guth opened the game with three strikeouts. Sharon batters were perplexed. The umpire did have an unusually low strike zone, but it was the same for both squads?

Franklin came to bat and got a lead off double. But not much more happened. A walk would lead to two stranded runners at the end of the first. This would become a theme. Walks and errors put many Frankin runners on base, but no results. 

Got to photograph a little freelance gig for my old friends at The Meadville Tribune. It's nice have good working relationships with area papers and web outlets so we can provide the best coverage to the communities we serve.

Tribune sports editor and perhaps the most caring local sports reporter I ever worked with, Lisa Renwick said this MASH squad has a chance at going all the way again. Nick Bancroft's squad won a state championship in 2019 in his first year of coaching. He is the son of legendary local volleyball coach Sheila Bancroft, who has hoisted more than one state championship trophy up over head,

One of the first games I remember photographing for the Derrick was a playoff game between Franklin and Hickory. To be honest I don't remember who won that one. While I was at the little field behind the elementary school today it looked like it might be an epic battle. I left shortly after the final photo in this series in which a player was hurt. At that point it was a neck and neck battle, but Hickory exploded to defeat the Knights.

I remember how hard it was to swing stick at a ball and make it go somewhere positive. It was once said that the hardest thing to do in sports is hit a fast ball. I agree, though I never wrestled... they claim the hardest six minutes in sports is in the circle on the mat.

I truly wish I could've heard this conversation today. This player was obviously hurt, but she made everyone laugh, including the athelic director/trainer Becky Barnes.

I almost didn't go to this game because I thought Titusville was a weak team and Franklin would eat them up again. I thought this simply because I went to a game they played in Titusville where Franklin dominated. But oh my that was not the case. I'm not smart enough to know why, but Titusville struck the ball exactly like Franklin did a month earlier and the results were almost identical, in the opposite way. The 10 run rule came in to play and this time the Rockets ended up on top. 

I had fun making photos, as I always do and this time the action seemed.... well more actiony!

I've been talking to a lot of folks about this blog and what it means.  I never fit 100% into the traditional news box, nor did I into the art box. I make pictures the best I can that depicts life. I love sports because no one on the field even knows Im there.

They are playing. They are concentrating. I am only documenting. To me that is beautiful. Life before my eyes and I revel in that. Give me this everyday! 

It is the expressions on faces that bring to life the moment. I've been discussing this a lot with colleagues and others as we watch newspaper after newspaper fail and those that still exist struggle with visually documenting the community. And they employ far fewer of us trained in how visuals speak.

A friend/not friend (facebook only), of mine retired and moved home to live. He documents his community and it is simply beautiful. And a gift to the history of that place. I'd love to do that. Just document a place for history so that what we do here in this fabric of life has a solid record.

And we should be recorded well.

We forget that life is made up of the little things we do. Yes sometimes our egos blow them through the roof of reality to the point we think we're the center of the universe, but each thing is important to the fabric of who we are.

Even this silly blog waxing on and on about the importance of the small things is riddled with ego, but there is a touch of truth to it. I love what I do and I want to keep doing it. It's because there are all these things in life that make up our everyday that we take for granted.... I want us to stop and pause briefly to understand how cool life truly is. And we should revel in it!

Even if you write two sentences in a row that end in a pronoun and don't care.

Playoffs are just around the corner and the local teams I see having a legitimate shot at districts are the two Franklin squads and Rocky Grove. I admit to not knowing much, but I hope to see at least one team hoisting a trophy in the next couple weeks.

Special thanks to our continued sponsor at the Buffalo Street Lanes! We hope folks are coming by and busting up some pins because they also support local storytelling and businesses.