With four straight victories, the Yorktown Patriots baseball team took over sole possession of first place in the Liberty District with an 8-3 victory.
Yorktown (13-5 overall) defeated the Wakefield Warriors, 14-5, for its most recent win in the high-school competition. Other victories were over the McLean Highlanders, 13-3, the Marshall Statesmen, 4-0, and the Washington-Liberty Generals, 1-0.
McLean (8-4) and the Langley Saxons (7-4) are each one game back in the loss column in the district. Yorktown hosts Langley in its final regular-season game on May 6. If Langley wins, there could be a three-way tie in the loss column for first.
A Yorktown win clinches first for the Patriots and gives the team the top seed in the district tournament.
The 27 runs scored in the consecutive games against McLean and Wakefield were the most since Yorktown plated 21 and 20 runs early in the 2021 campaign.
Against Wakefield, Isaac Hobbs had two hits (double) and three RBI, Owen Woodward doubled and had two hits and Coby Casalengo added two hits to lead the offense. Patrick Mellett had a hit and three RBI, Aidan McCracken had a hit and two RBI and Thomas Koomey had a hit and one RBI. Bryan Slattery stole two bases and scored twice.
Yorktown had 10 hits. McLean was hurt by four errors.
On the mound, Grayson McCarthy started and went four innings and Cameron Gonzalez and Jack Rucker each threw two frames of relief. Rucker fanned four and did not walk a batter.
Rucker had three hits with a solo homer and Jack Rubin belted a two-run blast against Wakefield, a game in which Yorktown trailed early, 3-1. McCracken doubled twice and drove in three runs, Woodward had two doubles, Hobbs doubled and had three RBI, John Rizzo had a run-scoring double, Slattery and Keegan Westhoff added RBI singles and Koomey singled and stole home.
Yorktown used four pitchers, including Rucker.
