Amazing Kenston Season Comes to End
June 15, 2022 by Alan Kornspan

The Kenston Bombers traveled to Akron's Canal Park June 10 to play the Northview Wildcats in the OHSAA state championship semi-final game — and they played a great game.

Game photos click here.

The Kenston Bombers traveled to Akron’s Canal Park June 10 to play the Northview Wildcats in the OHSAA state championship semi-final game — and they played a great game.

Going into the seventh inning, the score was even at 2-2. The Wildcats, however, scored the winning run in the bottom of the seventh to prevail, 3-2.

Kenston had one of the best baseball seasons in school history, being the first Bombers baseball team to compete in the state championships.

In post-game comments, Kenston Head Coach Joe Hritz discussed the meaningfulness of this historic season.

So many memories from this season,” said Hritz. “This is a huge year for this program as a whole.

This experience has been huge for them; again, it is really hard to get here. I’m not promising anything, but I think we have set some standards, some expectations for this program this year, and I think these boys will step up and take care of business next year.”

The state semi-final game began with both teams getting on the scoreboard early.

In the top of the first, the Bombers took a 1-0 lead when Patrick Munday drew a bases-loaded walk, scoring L.A. Mighton.

Northview quickly regained the lead in the bottom of the first, taking a 2-1 lead over the Bombers.

A pitcher’s duel emerged throughout the rest of the game as Kenston’s Jake Vasil and Northview’s Garrett Zimmerman were both in control on the mound.

The game remained 2-1 until the top of the fifth, when Carter Flynn scored for the Bombers to even the game at 2.

Flynn scored from third base when Northview tried the hidden ball trick. A balk was called on Zimmerman because he was still on the mound when the third baseman tagged Flynn.

Northview scored the final run of the game with two outs in the bottom of the seventh to advance to the OHSAA Division I Championship game, where the team would defeat Grove City to claim the state championship.

Lake Erie College commit Jake Vasil pitched an excellent game. On the day, he gave up no earned runs and five hits and struck out 10.

In the post-game press conference, his coach discussed the incredible impact Vasil has had on the Bombers.

Throughout the playoffs , Jake’s been crushing it the whole way,” Hritz said. “Jake threw phenomenal today. He’s a huge leader on this team. He sets the tone.”

While Vasil and six other seniors have graduated, the future looks extremely bright for Bombers baseball. Six players in the starting lineup for the state semi-final game should be returning next year: Bridger Bischoff, Flynn, Nikko Georgiou, Drew McKenna, Mighton and Munday.

We got some guys that faced adversity this year and stepped up, and we’re excited to see where we can go,” Hritz said. “We got some guys in this program that are not seen, not heard of, who are going to be big contributors in the next couple of years, so we’re excited to have them come up. There are definitely big shoes to fill with our seven seniors that are leaving, but we’ll be ready to go.”