Parkersburg Post 15 catcher Josiah DeMoss fields a ball as Marietta Post 64’s Brady Illar scores the go ahead run in Wednesday’s legion baseball game at Pioneer Park. Post 64 won, 3-2. (Photo by Mike Morrison)

Make no mistake about it, baseball can be a very crazy game that sometimes can produce some pretty crazy outcomes.

Parkersburg Post 15 pitchers Brady Swain and Isaac Baldwin combined to toss a no-hitter Wednesday evening against Marietta Post 64 at Don and Sue Schaly Field at Pioneer Park but the Parkersburg team came up on the short end of a 3-2 decision.

After Parkersburg strung together four consecutive base hits in the top of the fifth inning to take a 2-0 lead, Marietta repaid the favor by taking advantage of some Post 15 wildness to draw four consecutive walks and score three times in the bottom of the inning to take a lead they would never relinquish.

“Their kids threw a great game and had really good stuff but we just did not panic,” said Marietta head coach Chad Porter. “We were patient and got a couple of walks and then put the ball in play and made some things happen.”

For four innings the game was a pretty good pitchers dual between Swain and Post 64 starter Carson Gandee.

Swain allowed only a pair of base on balls over the first four innings of work while Gandee escaped bases loaded threats in the first two innings and then settled down to blank Parkersburg over his first four frames.

Gandee got some help from his defense in the fourth inning when third baseman and Warren Warrior teammate Trent Taylor made an outstanding play and throw on a hard hit ball down the line off of the bat of Parkersburg shortstop Caden Parker to end the inning.

“If you play a high level of catch on the mound and in the field no matter what you do at the plate you are going to give yourself a chance to win,” said Porter. “We did tonight and made all the routine plays and were able to grind out a win.” After stranding seven base runners over the first four innings, Parkersburg finally broke through against Gandee in the fifth.

After Carter McClain lined out to left field to open the inning, second baseman Dylan Holliday singled.

First baseman Evan Swain followed with a bullet over the right fielders head that went all the way to the fence with Holliday coming all the way around to score from first as Swain reached third with a stand-up triple.

Colin McCarter followed with an RBI single to plate Swain for the second run and moved himself into scoring position by stealing second base.

Porter elected to replace Gandee on the mound with Brady Illar to face Post 15 third baseman Mason Camp.

Parkersburg got a bad break when Camp hit a line drive right back up the middle that hit the second base umpire forcing a dead ball and making Camp who had scored to return to second base.

Illar made the break pay off as he fanned Baldwin for the second out and after Josiah DeMoss walked, Eli Davis flew out to right field to end the inning with Post 15 in front 2-0.

“We got a bad break there when the ball hit the umpire but you have just got to play through it,” said Parkersburg head coach Mike Goodwin. “You still have to play defense and can’t walk guys and we just let things get away from us after that.”

Brady Swain was cruising heading into the fifth inning as he had faced the minimum of nine Marietta batters over the previous three innings but the right hander suddenly developed control issues in the last of the fifth.

Hayden Pelletier, Noah Leesock and Illar each walked to load the bases and force Goodwin to bring Baldwin in to face Gandee.

Gandee also managed to draw a base on balls to force in Pelletier with the first run while the bases remained loaded.

Marietta second baseman Lucas Fullerton grounded out to third to plate Leesock with the second run of the inning and shortstop Jacob Sealey followed with a little roller down the third base line.

Baldwin pounced off the mound to field the ball but his throw to the plate was not in time as Illar slid around the tag of DeMoss to score what would prove to be the game winner.

Illar retired Post 15 in order in the sixth inning and allowed a two-out double to Camp in the last of the seventh before getting Baldwin to ground out to shortstop Sealey to end the game.

“It’s great to get a win… we are still trying to find that continuity in the lineup,” said Porter. “Even though we are 20 games in we haven’t found that right mix yet but every day I think we are getting better so we are excited about the next three or four weeks.”

Illar picked up the win in relief for Post 64 which improved to 9-11 on the season while Baldwin took the loss for Parkersburg as they slipped to 9-6.

“I really thought our pitchers pitched well but we left 11 runners on base and that’s the story tonight,” said Goodwin. “We had the bases loaded twice early and didn’t capitalize when we needed to.”

Both teams will be in action this weekend at a Fourth of July tournament at Don Coss Field in Cambridge.