OLEAN, N.Y. — Several Oilers have their work cut out for them to improve their summer batting averages.
The player who jump-started Olean’s biggest inning Friday night came in hitting .000.
Granted, Dan Stauffer was only 0-for-10 in limited action as a catcher. However, when the St. Marys, Pa. native and St. Bonaventure junior stepped to the plate with the bases loaded, he produced.
Stauffer hit a go-ahead, two-run single down the left field line, opening a six-run fourth that sparked the Oilers’ 10-7 win over the Mansfield Destroyers at Bradner Stadium.
“We started him out catching a little bit and then we were going to move him into the bullpen and now we’ve kind of got him back as a catcher, and he’s been working really hard,” Olean owner/manager Brian O’Connell Jr. said. “I saw a big smile on his face once he got that hit.”
There were more smiles in general for the Oilers (7-11-1) after their third win in four games. It’s the best stretch of the season for Olean, which hosts the Genesee Rapids (9-13) tonight at 6 p.m.
“The hitters are starting to buy into everything, and they’re doing a much better job than when we weren’t hitting the ball and scoring any runs,” O’Connell said.
The Oilers improved to 3-0 against Mansfield, which, at 11-11-1, owns the third-most points (23) in the New York Collegiate Baseball League standings. Olean’s previous wins came in seven innings via the 10-run rule. In another meeting June 17, suspended due to darkness, the Oilers jumped out to a 10-1 lead before the Destroyers tied the game at 12-12 in the ninth.
“I feel real confident and comfortable playing really any team,” O’Connell said. “These guys — I’ve said this all along — they definitely have the talent. We know — I’ve got a third of the players that I had last year back. It’s just a matter of just working together as a team and having good approach at the plate and scoring runs when we can.
“We’ve got to hit the ball to all fields of the park — you can’t just get up there and think you’re going to hit a home run, because you’re going to pop up. So I want to see more balls on the ground, I want to see more line drives, and that’s what we’re working on and that seems to be working for us in the last few games.”
The Oilers’ 1-5 hitters combined for nine of the team’s 11 hits — 10 off Mansfield starter Kyle Music, who lasted four innings. The 6-9 hitters, all of whom were batting below .200, had four of Olean’s seven walks.
Mason Nadolney (Jacksonville) went 3-for-4 to lead the Oilers. Canisius teammates Jacob Victor and Dylan Vincent had two hits each.
Three batters after Stauffer’s big hit in the fourth, Vincent added another two-run single with the bases loaded. The Olean High grad raised his team-leading batting average to .400.
Kevin Faulkner earned his first win in five appearances (two starts). The Jacksonville lefty pitched into the sixth inning after holding the Destroyers to one run through five. In the sixth, Faulkner and Alec Teska (St. John Fisher) combined to allow five runs on three hits and hit three batters, cutting Olean’s lead to 7-6. Four of the runs were charged to Faulkner, who left with a 7-3 lead and runners on first and second.
“He ran into a little trouble,” O’Connell said, “but he did a wonderful job up until that point.”
Andrew Walker (Xavier) had an RBI triple and Austin Schmitt (Louisiana Monroe) an RBI double in Mansfield’s five-run sixth.
O’Connell was pleased to see his team answer with two runs in the bottom of the frame.
“We had that one bad inning,” he said, “but we came right back and put the pressure on them and scored two. That’s the mark of a good team — when you can do things like that, instead of just getting down and then folding at that point in time.”
