Brian McKonly's two-run homer in the third sparks River Ridge's 9-6 win over Mitchell.
By GREG AUMAN
Published April 10, 2004
NEW PORT RICHEY - From here out, you can call Brian McKonly "Mr. District."
The River Ridge catcher has a home run in each of the Knights' three district games, the latest a two-run shot in the third inning Friday night that sparked the Royal Knights to a 9-6 win against rival Mitchell.
McKonly, who hit a three-run homer in a win against the Mustangs last month, added two RBI singles and tagged two runners out.
"He's a Mitchell killer, isn't he?" said River Ridge coach Jack Homko, whose team trailed 3-0 in the third, having been outhit 8-1. "He's been the guy we can count on. When we have runners in scoring position, he's been the guy who's come through consistently all year long."
McKonly's homer tied it at 3, and two infield errors in the third were a sign of bad things to come for the Mustangs (6-10, 0-3). Five of the Knights' nine runs were unearned, with a two-out error leading to a run in the fourth and two more runners who reached on errors scoring in the fifth.
"We imploded for a couple of innings," said Mitchell coach Phil Bell, whose team had three hits each from Josh Le'Roy, C.J. Hanson and Theo Papapanos. "This was a good baseball game with some bad baseball in the middle. I thought we hit the ball well today, but we just kicked it around for two innings and things snowballed."
Friday's win marked an encouraging return for River Ridge ace Mike Gasparino, who pitched for the first time since spraining his knee a month ago. He threw three innings of scoreless relief to improve to 3-0, and Steve Bamber pitched the final two for his fourth save. Derek Shaw (1-3) took the loss for the Mustangs.
The Knights (8-7, 3-0) can clinch the regular-season title in their three-team district and an automatic playoff berth with a win Friday at home against Land O'Lakes. Playing a district game has meant good things for McKonly, who said the key to his success has been not trying to do too much.
"I try to go out and be myself," McKonly said. "When you try too hard to keep up with the better hitters in the area, you usually do more poor than good."
