Norwin baseball keeping eye on the ball after sweeping Hempfield

By: Bill Beckner Jr.
Sunday, April 12, 2026 | 11:01 AM

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Norwin has the look of a WPIAL contender again, but the Knights haven’t played their best baseball yet. Coaches and players will attest to that.

“We haven’t won anything yet,” coach Craig Spisak said after the Knights swept rival Hempfield in a three-game Section 2-6A series. “It’s nice what we did, but we have a long way to go. It’s one game, one series at a time.”

Norwin improved to 5-1 (3-0 in section) as it prepared to face unbeaten Canon-McMillan (8-0, 3-0) in another section test.

The Knights were mostly sharp at the plate and on the mound against Hempfield, holding off the Spartans in all three games, 6-5, 6-3 and 3-2.

In the opener, Trevor Vitsas and Zane Markovitz each had two hits, with Markovitz belting a home run, and Matt O’Neil allowed three hits and struck out eight.

Aidan Beveridge earned the save.

The second game saw nearly a dozen MLB scouts converge on Norwin to watch Caden Sivrich pitch.

The senior right-hander allowed two hits and struck out 10, reaching 95 mph on the radar gun, to lead the Knights.

He and Derek Berger hit three-run home runs. Jake Knight picked up the save.

Knight made his varsity debut on the mound in Game 3 and earned the narrow victory, tossing 51/3 innings before giving way to Chase Butker, who earned the save.

Tristyn Tavares had two hits, including a double, and Berger drove in two runs.

“We need to play cleaner baseball,” Spisak said. “We need to improve our defense and do a better job of getting ahead of batters.

“We’re going to try to keep getting better. We’re a senior-loaded team with a lot of games under out belts.”

Norwin has 19 players on the varsity roster and 13 are seniors. The rest are juniors.

Bill Beckner Jr. is a TribLive reporter covering local sports in Westmoreland County. He can be reached at bbeckner@triblive.com.

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