BUTLER TWP - It was almost too easy for Curt Schnur. Then Mars II made things a bit uneasy for Saxonburg.

Schnur threw just 63 pitches - 46 for strikes - in the first six innings for Saxonburg in Game 1 of its best-of-five Eagle County baseball semifinal series Saturday evening at Highfield.

He took a 4-0 lead into the final inning and was working on a two-hit shutout. He wound up working especially hard just to get a win as Mars II had the tying and go-ahead runs on base before succumbing to a 4-3 defeat.

"They come out every game and battle you," Saxonburg manager Dan Cunningham said. "I'm sure they'll be ready to come right back at us Monday."

Schnur had allowed just two base runners - singles by Adam Schmidhammer and Clint Shaffer - and retired 13 consecutive hitters before Mars II finally made a run at him.

Brian Hart singled to left with one out in the seventh. Randy Sheetz did the same. Matt Rovnan hit a pop fly to shallow center field.

Center fielder Brendan Malone called off the shortstop, but dropped the ball. A throw to third for a seemingly easy force-out on Hart sailed into the dugout. With runners on second and third, Josh Rape singled to center to pull Mars II within 4-3.

Mike Skurko singled to right and took second on an errant throw to third. Just like that, Mars II was in position to take the lead.

"One fielding mistake and it all blows up," Cunningham said. "And the thing is, Brendan Malone probably won't make another error in three years."

"We hit the ball fairly solidly much of the game," Mars II manager Scott Shankel said. "But we were hitting it at people."

Saxonburg considered intentionally walking Clint McCandless to load the bases and set up a double play.

Schnur thought otherwise.

"The bottom of their lineup was coming up," he said. "That rally made me that much more competitive. I like being the man with the ball. I wanted to go after it."

And he got it.

Schnur struck out McCandless looking and got Shaffer to hit a dribbler in front of the plate. Catcher Matt DeSantis threw to first to retire Shaffer and preserve the win.

"Curt knows how to get outs when he needs them," Cunningham said. "He's been doing this for a while."

Schnur wound up throwing 84 pitches and did not walk a batter. Losing pitcher McCandless threw just 91 pitches as the game was played in less than 90 minutes.

"I want to keep the ball down, throw strikes and not waste time," Schnur said. "That's my goal every time I take the mound."

DeSantis had a run-scoring double in the first inning to get Saxonburg on the board. Chase Rowe added a run-scoring single in the third.

Jason Curry's sacrifice fly plated a run in the fourth and Steve Hall hit a solo homer to left in the sixth to complete Saxonburg's offense.

"We held a good hitting team to four runs," Shankel said. "That's why we're still playing, because we've been able to keep the scores low. We need to do that because we don't score a lot of runs ourselves.

"It would have been nice to win this one, but this is better than coming up here and getting blown out. That team is beatable and our guys believe we can win this."

Mars II is in the Eagle County League playoffs for the first time. Saxonburg is trying to advance to the championship series for the seventh consecutive year.

Mars II 000 000 3 - 3 6 0

Saxonburg 101 101 x - 4 7 3

WP:

Curt Schnur (7 IP) 6 strikeouts, 0 walks.

LP:

Clint McCandless (6 IP) 3 strikeouts, 3 walks

Mars II (12-19):

Adam Schmidhammer 1B, Brian Hart 1B, Randy Sheetz 1B, Josh Rape 1B 2-RBI, Mike Skurko 1B, Chet Shaffer 1B

Saxonburg (24-6):

Chase Rowe 1B RBI, Matt DeSantis 2B 1B RBI, Tim Nebel 1B, Steve Hall HR 1B, Dan O'Brien 1B, Jason Curry RBI

Today:

Game 2-Saxonburg @ Mars II, 6 p.m.