After being sidelined with the rest of the sports world in the spring of 2020, the Portville baseball team certainly made the most of what came next.
In 2021, during a shortened season, Portville went undefeated through the regular year and came within a game of its ultimate goal, finishing 16-1 with a sectional title game loss to Gowanda.
A year later, the Panthers avenged that loss, beating Gowanda in New York State’s Section 6 Class C final, then beat Oakfield-Alabama in the Far West Regional to reach the state semifinal for the first time since 1998. But Section 9’s Chester spoiled the party on Friday at Union-Endicott, taking the semifinal 8-1 and ending Portville’s season at 21-2.
But after two nearly spotless years, the Panthers are set to lose a strong core of seniors, including five starters: Maxx Yehl, Luke Petruzzi, Nathan Petryszak, Dakota Mascho and Ryan Stillman.
“I told them, our last two years we were 37-3,” PCS coach Mike Matz said following a season-ending loss to Chester on Friday. “I mean there’s your legacy right there, 37-3. But they brought a lot.”
OF THOSE five, four started for three years — not counting the missing season of 2020 — and Petruzzi stepped in as an impact player in 2021 after transferring.
“Obviously the COVID year, they had a year ripped away from them, but they’re all in my mind four-year starters,” Matz said, “all of them except Luke Petruzzi because he transferred in. But those other guys have been with us a long time, they’ve played a lot for us and done a lot of really great things. Whoever plays that spot next year, don’t try and fill shoes because those are pretty big shoes to fill.”
For at least one graduating Panther, the baseball season is just beginning. Yehl, a West Virginia University-bound hard-throwing left-handed pitcher, joined the Olean Oilers’ roster on Sunday after his high school season ended. And he wasn’t the only Division I athlete on the team: Mascho signed his college letter last month to join Clarion University’s Division I wrestling team next year.
But more than the success on the field, Matz said he just appreciated being around his players this season. The wins were a bonus.
“This is the most fun team,” Matz said. “Obviously they’re really good. But I would have loved these guys just the same if they were 5-15. They’re just awesome kids with awesome families. I couldn’t ask for (more).
“I was telling those guys, some people thought we were crazy because we kept 20 kids on the team. When you’ve got 20 kids like that, why wouldn’t you keep them all? They’re all great kids. They all fill a role for us, they all do a great job, why on earth would we (not); let’s keep all 20 of them, have a great time.”
THE 2022 Panthers shared a kinship with the only other Portville team to make the final four. Matz was a senior at Allegany-Limestone when Portville made its ‘98 run to the state championship game and knew many of those players. On several game days this postseason, he donned a throwback uniform from that season in the dugout.
“I played against them and played with them and actually I’ve got a group message with a bunch of them just keeping them up to date on how we’re doing, what’s going on,” Matz said before the team took off for Binghamton last week. “It’s really cool. I just got this long string of messages from them and they’re talking about that year like it was last week. Like, ‘Oh, remember this? Remember that?’ That’s the thing that I want for these kids. These kids are making memories now that they’ll have when they’re my age and beyond.”
The congratulatory messages and well-wishes came from far and wide.
“It’s really neat that we’ve got some of the guys from that team that are so interested in what we’re doing and rooting for us,” Matz noted. “For some of those guys, I mean Josh Lisac who was one of the star pitchers on that team, he lives in Norway now. He’s on that message, ‘oh, this is awesome guys, way to go.’ It’s really cool. I don’t know if Josh Lisac has been to Portville probably since 2000, but just last week we were messaging and he said ‘Man, I really miss baseball.’ This is a guy who’s married, has children, lives out of the country, graduated 25 years ago and he’s still thinking about it and talking about it.”
Maybe in 25 years or so, the same bond will exist for this group of Panthers.
(Sam Wilson, Olean Times Herald sports writer and Salamanca Press sports editor, may be contacted at swilson@oleantimesherald.com)
