YEATESVILLE — Like Tuesday’s unseasonably warm weather, the Northside bats got hot early and cooled off late, but when the sun set the Panthers had earned their first Four Rivers Conference win of the season by topping defending league champions Plymouth 10-5 in both team’s conference opener.
The Panthers 4-1 (1-0) jumped on the Vikings (4-2, 0-1) early as they scored three runs in the first inning and five in the second to chase Plymouth starter Hunter Cook out of the game before the start of the third.
On the flip side, Northside senior ace Brandon Marsh dominated in his four innings of work as he allowed zero hits, fanned six and walked one to get the win.
“I was really pleased with the way we started the game,” Northside coach Keith Boyd said. “Brandon pitched very well … He did an outstanding job tonight.”
Northside’s top of the order was also outstanding as the team’s No. 1-4 hitters tallied six of the Panthers’ eight hits and eight of their 10 runs.
Three-hitter Ryan Arthur led the offensive as he went 2-4 with four RBIs, while leadoff hitter Caleb Sherman was 2-3 with an RBI, No. 2 hitter Marsh went 1-1 with a triple and two RBIs and cleanup hitter Dillon Cutler went 1-3 and drove in a run.
After Sherman led off the game with a double, Marsh reached on an error and Arthur drove them both home to take a 2-0 lead. Sherman would eventually come home on a Neill Gibbs fielder’s choice.
Northside struck again the next inning as Arthur delivered a two-run double, while Marsh, Cutler and Tyler Waters each picked up an RBI to extend their lead to 8-0.
Cook, who struggled from the start, was pulled with the score 6-0 and no outs in the second inning in favor of lefty Josh Wynne.
“Hunter just wasn’t locating well and we also made some errors behind him and they got some seeing-eye singles,” Plymouth coach Terry Perry said. “He made some good pitches but it just wasn’t his day.”
Wynne, who entered the game with runners on second and third, minimized the damage by allowing two runs without giving up a hit.
Wynne would finish the game allowing three hits and a total of four runs in six innings.
Down 8-0, Plymouth got aggressive on the base paths and took advantage of five Panthers’ errors to put as scare into Northside.
The Vikings got their first run in the third when Mathew Luten scored on a catcher’s interference call, while Joe Whitenhouse scored their second run in the fourth thanks to another error.
With Sherman in for Marsh at the start of the fifth, the Panthers defense once again looked shaky as it committed two errors, which along with a Sean Holloway RBI single, led to three runs to make it an 8-5 game heading into the sixth.
In the home half of the sixth the Panthers would put the game out of reach as they tacked on two runs thanks to an RBI single by Sherman and a run-scoring triple by Marsh.

Plymouth    001    130    0    –    5    4    2
Northside    350    002    X    –    10    8    5
WP: Brandon Marsh; LP: Hunter Cook
Hitting: P — Chris Rogerson 1-3 (r), Hunter Cook 1-3 (r), Sean Holloway 1-4 (RBI, R), Zach Sawyer 1-2; N — Caleb Sherman 2-3 (RBI, 2 R), Brandon Marsh 1-1 (3B, 2 RBI, 2 R), Ryan Arthur 2-4 (4 RBI, 2B, 2R), Dillon Cutler 1-3 (RBI), Tyler Waters 1-3, Caleb Coltrain 1-3.