SHIPPENSBURG -- The Shippensburg Stars won a pivotal game three on Saturday afternoon at Memorial Park, rallying for a 4-3 West Shore Twilight Baseball League playoff victory over the Chambersburg Maroons.

The win gave the Stars a 2-1 lead in the best-of-five semifinal series. The Maroons will look to avoid elimination tonight at 5:45 at Henninger Field.

"Being up 2-1 is nice," Ship manager Whitey Carroll said. "It gives us two games to finish them off."

Chambersburg (26-15) took a 2-0 lead in the first inning, as Josh Davis laced a one-out single and Christian Egolf and Cody Stinger (2-for-3, double) reached on consecutive Shippensburg errors to lead the bases.

Maroons pitcher Josh McCauley (2-for-4) then helped himself with a two-run single. The score remained that way until the bottom of the fourth, when the Stars (28-10-1) tied the game on an RBI single by Mike Orndorff and a run-scoring fielder's choice by Kyle Helm.

In the fifth, Chambersburg momentarily went in front on Stinger's single that plated Davis.

But Ship put together the winning rally in the bottom half of the frame. With two outs, Rick Shumway, Toby Souders (3-for-3, two runs) and Andrew Burke hit consecutive singles to tie the game before Kevin Scholly doubled in the go-ahead run.

It was just enough support for the Stars' Tim Martin, who scattered seven hits and one earned run for his fourth win. He walked two and struck out five.

McCauley also went the distance, allowing


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two earned runs with four strikeouts.

"Last night (9-8 walk-off loss) was tough, but we battled back," Carroll said. "Martin threw a good game. We gave up two unearned runs there in the first innings but he battled the whole way through."

Mechanicsburg 2, Enola 0: The Cardinals moved within one game of eliminating top seed Enola after a strong outing by Travis Miller.

Miller scattered seven hits in the complete-game victory, his sixth on the year, walking just one while striking out eight. Mechanicsburg (27-13) struck for single runs in the first and second inning, with Jamie Haas and Ben Anderson (2-for-4) picking up runs batted in.

Justin Yoder (5 strikeouts) was the tough-luck loser for Enola (29-12), which must travel to Mechanicsburg today at 1 p.m. for game four of the WSTBL best-of-five semifinal series.

Shippensburg 4, Chambersburg 3

Chambersburg 200 010 0 -- 3-7-3

Shippensburg 000 220 x -- 4-8-4

Chambersburg Pitching

ip h r er bb so

Josh McCauley (L,4-3) 6 8 4 2 0 4

Shippensburg Pitching

Tim Martin (W,4-2) 7 7 3 1 2 5

2B--(C) Cody Stinger; (S) Kevin Scholly.

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Mechanicsburg 2, Enola 0

Mechanicsburg 110 000 0 -- 2-7-1

Enola 000 000 0 -- 0-7-0

WP--Travis Miller (6-1). LP--Justin Yoder (5-1).