The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

The Slippery Rock Sliders hope that step came Saturday.

Having seen a 4-0 lead dissipate to the Butler BlueSox Saturday, Mike Porcaro’s RBI single in the top of the 10th inning proved to be the difference as the Sliders came away with a 5-4 Prospect League victory at Pullman Park.

The Sliders had gone 10-20 in the Eastern Division’s first half and dropped seven of their first eight in the second half before Saturday’s triumph against the first-place BlueSox.

“The last five or six games, we’ve laid only one egg,” said Sliders manager Shawn Pynn. “We battled and battled and battled. We knew when we got the strikeout with the bases loaded, that sucked the air out of the stadium.”

Butler had loaded the bases after two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning — George Roberts had doubled and Matt Albaugh drew an intentional walk and Jason Radwan a conventional walk before Brent Roehrich struck out Eric Hess to end the threat.

“(Roehrich) was out there for a reason,” Pynn said. “He’s a big-game guy. He did a heck of a job closing the game out for us.”

“We just didn’t come up with the clutch hit,” Butler manager Anthony Rebyanski said. “A big one was with the bases loaded and we couldn’t get it. Hey, it’s baseball. That was the second great game in a row (Butler beat Slippery Rock 1-0 on Friday). We start new on Sunday.”

In the 10th inning, Alex Lang and Zach Looney opened with singles off Butler reliever Chris Marangon to place runners on the corners. That brought in Adam Dian, who surrendered the go-ahead RBI single to Porcaro.

After a wild pitch advanced the runners and an intentional pass was given to Radley Haddad, Dian fanned Derek Peake, Dan Hurlimann and Steve Sulcoski to end the inning.

Neal Jacobs opened the bottom of the 10th with a single and advanced to second base on a sacrifice bunt by Gavin Meyer.

Roehrich fanned Brendan Costantino, then Sliders center fielder Ryan Abernathy— a late-game substitution of Trent Wooldridge — made a diving catch of an Elliott Caldwell liner to end the game.

“He made me look like a genius,” Pynn said.

The Sliders had taken a 1-0 lead in the second inning when Hurlimann singled and scored on an throwing error.

A Sulcoski two-run single in the fourth inning plus a run on a ground-ball double play made it a 4-0 Sliders advantage.

Slippery Rock starter Max Deering looked strong early, limiting Butler (8-2) to no runs and two hits through four innings.

Then, the BlueSox began to chip away.

With two outs in the fifth inning, Meyer singled, then scored on a Costantino double.

In the sixth, Kyle Petty and Roberts started the inning with singles, then a double steal moved the runners into scoring position. Radwan promptly laced a two-run single before Deering recorded a pair of strikeouts to end the rally.

Butler tied the game in the seventh inning on a two-out, run-scoring single by Roberts.

The BlueSox were able to battle back as Marangon tossed five shutout innings, allowing just three hits and striking out six until the decisive 10th inning.

“Marangon has been tough all year,” Rebyanski said. “He gave us a chance.”

Butler, however, stranded seven runners between the seventh and ninth innings and 13 for the game.

“As long as we minimize those big innings, we’ll be OK,” Pynn said. “The most they scored in an inning was two runs. It’s not like we let four runs in one inning. We were able to bear down and it was fantastic.

“We play (Butler) and Richmond a lot in the second half. We’re five games back, As long as we continue to get good starting and relief pitching, we’ll be fine,” Pynn added.

“Everyone battled so much,” said Rebyanski of his team. “They want this. That’s hard to instill. I get texts every night saying, ‘Don’t worry. We’ll get them next time.’ This is a special group of players.”

Notes: Caldwell’s single gave him 68 hits, one away from tying the BlueSox record. The Prospect League record is 80. ... The attendance was 765.

Slippery Rock 010 300 000 1 — 5 9 1

Butler 000 012 100 0 — 4 12 1

W: Brent Roehrich 2 IP (2K, 2BB). L: Chris Marangon 5+ IP (6K, 0BB).

Slippery Rock (2-8): Zach Looney 2-1B; Mike Porcaro 2-1B, RBI; Radley Haddad 2B; Steve Sulcoski 2-1B, 2 RBI; Drew Bryan 1B; Alex Lang 1B

Butler (8-2): Brendan Costantino 2B, 3B, RBI; Elliott Caldwell 1B; Kyle Petty 1B; George Roberts 2-1B, 2B, RBI; Matt Albaugh 2B; Jason Radwan 1B, 2 RBI; Eric Hess 1B; Gavin Meyer 1B; Neal Jacobs 1B