PIAA baseball: Kyle Casteel quiets Mifflin County as Butler advances to Class 6A quarterfinals
LEWISTOWN — Kyle Casteel got the last word in.
A beat before second baseman Jake Szebalskie’s putout reached Nolan Stefaniak at first base — stamping the Golden Tornado’s 2-1 PIAA Class 6A first-round playoff win — the senior standout pitcher concisely let Mifflin County’s Lincoln Ruble know his side’s season was over.
As Ruble was running down the first-base line, Casteel leaned in his direction and simply said: “Your season’s over.”
Casteel didn’t shout or raise his voice. There was no fist pumping or look-at-me display. But the typically poised West Virginia commit, who says “you can be going somewhere, but not show it at the same time” had to respond to the Huskies.
They indirectly — but purposely — jabbed at Casteel at various times.
After Chase Leister’s first-inning RBI single, the home team’s dugout partied hard. When Easton Lepley walked on four pitches to lead off the bottom of the seventh, prompting Butler assistant coach Matt Clement to meet Casteel on the mound, Mifflin County’s bench tried to rattle him some more.
Casteel got Carson Cherry to ground into a double play, hosing down any flicker of hope the Huskies (14-6) tried to ignite, before Ruble bounced one to second.
“Emotions got to me there,” Casteel said of his remark. “Just, that whole game was up and down. It was just a dogfight back and forth. So I feel like those emotions come out in baseball. ... I don’t think I’m that trash-talker, but in the heat of that moment, that did come out, and that just shows my competitive spirit to everyone.”
Golden Tornado coach Josh Forbes won’t dock his players for having an edge.
“You gotta play this game with a little bit of emotion, because it’s an emotionless game — and you’ve gotta control them all the time,” Forbes said. “Because you fail so much, and you really wanna let (out) a, ‘Let’s go!’ You wanna say that kind of stuff. It’s all in good fun.
“And I thought Kyle was pretty composed until that final out, when he could finally breathe and say, like, ‘Let’s go! It’s over!’”
Butler (20-3) will challenge District 3 runner-up Chambersburg, a 5-0 winner over Downingtown West, in Thursday’s state quarterfinals at a time and place to be determined.
The WPIAL champs weren’t thrilled they had to hit the road for this matchup — while Casteel woke up at 8 a.m. to get ready for the trip, “they probably slept real nice in their beds,” he said — and, after a stop at Chick-Fil-A about halfway through its three-hour bus ride, took some time to get the ball rolling offensively.
Mavrik Clement’s one-out blast to left field in the top of the fourth was the answer the Tornado needed to Mifflin County’s only run in the first inning. Casteel, who allowed three hits in the first, allowed two more the rest of the way. He struck out five.
Butler went ahead in the top of the seventh. Szebalskie singled to start, then was bumped to second by Nash Cuffman’s sacrifice bunt. Boden Lenyk doubled down the left-field line to push the game-winning run across.
Forbes’ heart rate didn’t spike when Casteel let Lepley on to start the next half-inning. Clement’s mound visits are always lighthearted, and the now-former longtime Butler boys hoops coach carried the same mindset.
“So what?” Clement told Casteel before he finished off a complete-game effort.
“A guy on first, a guy on second, whatever,” Forbes said. “They can go and they can strike guys out. And, to be honest, we have a lot of trust and we have a lot of faith that they can do that. And he rolled up a double play in one of the most crucial times of the game.
“Once we got (those) two outs, they were kinda defeated.”
Casteel, Stefaniak and the younger Clement have all dealt with the attention that comes with being Division I commits. The latter two will be the battery when the Golden Tornado plays next.
“It’s honestly a blessing to have that target on your back,” Casteel said. “Every single game, to come out here, people wanna get a hit off you, and, if they do get a hit, they tell people. ... No matter what they say in there, you have to compete every single time.”
Butler 000 100 1 — 2 5 0
Mifflin County 100 000 0 — 1 5 0
WP: Kyle Casteel 7IP (5K, 1BB). LP: Chase Hartung 6.1 IP (7K, 2BB)
Butler (20-3): Boden Lenyk 2B RBI, Mavrik Clement HR RBI R, Nolan Stefaniak 1B, Blake Scott 1B, Jake Szebalskie 1B.
Mifflin County (14-6): Evan Strohecker 1B, Jayden Smith 1B R, Karl Shirey 1B, Chase Leister 1B RBI
Thursday: Butler vs. Chambersburg, TBD in PIAA Class 6A quarterfinal
