Latrobe gets WPIAL finals rematch with Hopewell in Class 4A 1st round

By: Paul Schofield
Friday, May 10, 2024 | 5:45 PM

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It shouldn’t be hard for Latrobe baseball coach Matt Basciano to get his team up for its WPIAL Class 4A first-round playoff game.

That’s because when the WPIAL released the pairings Friday, Latrobe found out its opponent is Hopewell, the team that defeated the Wildcats, 4-3, in the 2023 district finals at Wild Things Park.

Is it time for a little payback?

Basciano said he doesn’t know about payback, but after he did his research about which opponent his team would face, he wasn’t surprised it was Hopewell (9-9, 4-6).

The teams play at 4 p.m. Wednesday at Plum.

“I guess because we played them in the championship game, people get excited about that,” Basciano said. “We projected Hopewell after looking at things.

“We don’t know much about them. Now I have to see what they have returning. I know their pitcher is gone.”

Basciano said he was surprised his team was seeded fifth. He thought the Wildcats would be a sixth seed and credited his team’s strength of schedule for the upgrade.

“We played against four or five teams that were larger than us,” Basciano said. “We got rewarded about the schedule. Now we have to get ready. Seeds don’t matter. We can only focus on us.”

The fifth-seeded Wildcats (17-3, 8-2) were sitting pretty heading into the final week of the season, but they dropped two close games to Belle Vernon and finished a game behind the Leopards in the Section 2 standings.

Belle Vernon ended up by seeded No. 1.

The Wildcats are led offensively by junior Mason Leonard (.348), senior Jacob Cramer (.348), junior Andrew Hantz (.333) and junior Luke Nipar-Smith (.308).

On the mound, the Wildcats are led by senior Riley Smith (4-0, 0.78 ERA), Nipar-Smith (4-1, 3.92), senior Dominick Cararini (4-1, 1.15) and junior Jack Stynchula (2-1, 0.71).

Latrobe returns five starters who played against Hopewell in the championship game: junior shortstop Cooper Basciano, the coach’s son, senior catcher Louie Amatucci, first baseman Cramer, who started in left field, third baseman Riley Smith, and junior center fielder Eli Boring, who started in right field.

“We definitely have some kids that knew what to expect in the playoffs,” Coach Basciano said. “We have to focus on what we do best.”

Belle Vernon (13-3, 9-1) will face No. 16 Blackhawk (7-10, 4-6) at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday at Boyce Mayview Park.

Hempfield and Norwin must wait until May 20 before they play their first playoff games in Class 6A.

The fourth-seeded Spartans (14-6, 10-5) face No. 5 Seneca Valley (10-8-1, 7-5) and the sixth-seeded Knights (11-9, 8-5) will play third-seeded North Allegheny (14-5, 9-3). Both games are at a site and time to be determined.

The top two teams in Class 6A are Mt. Lebanon (16-4, 13-2) and Pine-Richland (16-5, 10-2).

In Class 5A, because there was a four-way tie between Fox Chapel, Plum, Franklin Regional and Penn-Trafford for the Section 1 title, the baseball committee worked hard to create a fair bracket.

West Allegheny (15-3, 7-3) ended up with the top seed and Fox Chapel was awarded the second seed.

Plum was seeded fifth, Franklin Regional (12-7, 9-3) sixth and Penn-Trafford 15-3, 9-3) seventh.

Franklin Regional will face No. 11 Connellsville (11-9, 5-5) at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday at Gateway and Penn-Trafford battles No. 10 Moon (9-7, 5-5) at 2 p.m. Wednesday at Gateway.

Mt. Pleasant received a No. 3 seed in Class 3A behind No. 1 Riverside and No. 2 Mohawk.

The Vikings will meet No. 14 Burrell (9-7, 8-4) at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at Gateway.

No. 10 Greensburg Salem (8-8, 8-4) will play No. 7 Avonworth (12-8, 8-2) at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Peterswood Park in McMurray. No. 5 Valley (16-4, 9-3) will meet No. 12 Shenango (9-9, 6-6) at 7 p.m. Tuesday at North Allegheny.

The top seed in Class 2A is Serra Catholic (15-1, 12-0). The No. 2 seed is OLSH (16-4, 13-1), Seton-LaSalle (14-3, 12-2) is No. 3, and Burgettstown (11-3-1, 11-1) is No. 4.

No. 5 Greensburg Central Catholic (11-4, 10-2) goes against No. 12 Washington (8-8, 5-7) at 2 p.m. Tuesday at Gateway, while No. 13 Jeannette (7-9, 5-7) gets Burgettstown at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Burkett Park in Robinson.

The championship games will be held May 28-29 at Wild Things Park in Washington.

Paul Schofield is a TribLive reporter covering high school and college sports and local golf. He joined the Trib in 1995 after spending 15 years at the Daily Courier in Connellsville, where he served as sports editor for 14 years. He can be reached at pschofield@triblive.com.

Tags: Franklin Regional, Latrobe, Penn-Trafford