CRANBERRY TWP — Six batters had multiple hits for Cranberry Township as it defeated the Captains, 8-1, in Game 3 of the Eagle County League baseball semifinal playoff Monday night at North Boundary Park.

Cranberry Township takes a 2-1 lead in this best-of-five series.

“It all started with our starting pitcher, Mike Patsch,” Cranberry Township player/manager Bill Clinefelter said. “He’s won some big playoff games for us in the past and did it again today.”

Patsch’s stats are nothing to gawk at with just two strikeouts and no walks through seven innings, but he pitched to contact and got plenty of help from his defense.

Cranberry Township (19-8-1) drew first blood in the top of the first, scoring off hits from Brandon Pouch and Jesse Clary.

“I thought Cranberry did a nice job of getting clutch at-bats,” Captains’ player/manager Brandon Rossier said. “But some of our pitchers let the ball up at times. We weren’t getting some calls in the zone a bit, but that wasn’t why they got so many base hits.”

In the bottom half of the first, the Captains answered back off an RBI-single from Frank Cinicola to cut Cranberry’s lead to two at 3-1.

The three runs by Cranberry in the first proved to be all the runs they needed, but that didn’t stop them from adding two more in the third and three in the sixth to ultimately take home a seven-run win.

“We just jumped on them early,” Clinefelter said. “That kind of makes you relax a little bit and play your game from there on out.”

For Cranberry, Clary ended the day 3-for-4 with two singles and a double, while Pouch, Jeremy Iellimo, Nash Matson, Ben Murray and Justin Stewart all recorded two hits apiece.

“I don’t want to see much different on Wednesday,” Clinefelter said. “If we come out of the box, take an early lead and keep the pressure on them, we’ll be fine.”

Nick Drake took the loss on the mound for the Captains (19-5-1), going five innings with two strikeouts and two walks.

Cinicola ended the day 2-for-3 with two singles, while Austin Young followed up with a single and a double for the Captains.

Game 4 will take place Wednesday again at North Boundary Park, starting at 6 p.m.

“I’d like to see some more intensity,” Rossier said. “Our team was kind of dead after we got a few runs against us and I think just having better approaches at the plate and getting good swings on the ball — if we do that, we should win.”

Cranberry Twp 302 003 0 — 8 14 1

Captains 100 000 0 — 1 7 2

W: Mike Patsch 7IP (2K, 0BB). L: Nick Drake 5IP (2K, 2BB).

Cranberry Twp: Jesse Clary 2-1B, 2B, Nash Matson 1B, 3B, Brandon Pouch 1B, 2B

Captains: Frank Cinicola 2-1B, Austin Young 1B, 2B, Jake Rocco 1B

Wednesday: Captains at Cranberry Township, 6 p.m. at North Boundary Park

Mars 14, Sliders 13

Brendan Malone hit a walk-off RBI-single in the bottom of the seventh to help Mars defeat the Sliders in Game 3 of the league’s other semifinal series at Callery Field.

The win propels Mars into the championship series and it will face the winner of the Cranberry Township/Captains series.

Three Mars players collected home runs, as Jim Paseine took home the win on the mound for Mars in relief with one strikeout through one inning pitched.