CRESTLINE — Although the Crestline Bulldogs baseball team still has three regular season games to play in the next calender week, they welcomed the Wynford Royals to Gates Brown Field on Tuesday for sectional semi-final action.

The No. 7 Royals came away with the 8-3 victory over the No. 6 seeded Bulldogs to hault the Crestline postseason run. The victory advances Wynford to the sectional finals where they will meet up with the Ridgemont Golden Gophers on their home field in Mount Victory. This contest is set to take place on Thursday May 11 at 5 pm.

The scoring started early for the visiting Royals as they jumped out to a 3-1 lead after one inning thanks to two singles and a double off of Crestline starting pitcher, JR Wolfe. Crestline responded in the bottom of the first when Wolfe belted a triple with two outs and later scored on a wild pitch.

A one-two-three top of the second for the Bulldogs defense gave them a chance to cut into the early Wynford lead. After beginning the frame with a flyout by Bailey Wollard, Logan Ronk, Kaden Ronk and JC Clark belted three consecutive singles. Clark’s single drove in Logan Ronk for the second run for the Bulldogs. Ronk and Clark would be left on the base path and the Royals’ lead was one run; 3-2.

Wynford would tack on a single run in the third and fourth innings while holding the Crestline offense to just one hit over that time frame to take the lead; 5-2.

A lead-off double by Kevin Winkler sparked the Bulldogs offense in the bottom of the fifth. After a single by Zac Hatfield, Wolfe would hit a deep sacrifice fly that nearly left the yard to score Winkler from third, making the score 5-3 heading into the top of the sixth inning. Just one hit combined for the two teams made the sixth the only scoreless inning throughout the game. The lone highlight from the top half of the sixth was the completion of an unassisted double play by Logan Ronk from the second base position.

Crestline would go on to commit four costly errors in the visiting half of the seventh inning and Wolfe allowed three runs to cross the plate thanks to a 2-RBI double and an RBI single off the bats of the Royals. Wolfe would record one out in the sixth before head coach made the pitching change to bring in Hatfield. Hatfield would record the two outs but Crestline found themselves in an 8-3 with just three outs remaining. The Bulldogs couldn’t mount the comeback and would fall by that score.

Wolfe was the losing pitcher for Crestline, going 6.1 innings, allowing eight runs and nine hits while walking four batters, hitting four batters and also striking out four Royals’ hitters. Hatfield worked a flawless 0.2 innings to finish out the game. Hatfield also finished with two singles at the plate for the Bulldogs.

Singles: Ty Clark, Logan Ronk, Kaden Ronk, JC Clark

Doubles: Kevin Winkler; Triples: JR Wolfe

Runs scored: Wolfe, Logan Ronk, Winkler; RBI: Wolfe, JC Clark

Crestline will travel to Danville to play the Blue Devils in Mid-Buckeye Conference on Wednesday May 10. On Friday, the Bulldogs will host the Blue Devils. Mansfield Christian will be Crestline’s final game of the season. Crestline will travel to the Flames’ home field on Saturday May 13.