Catasauqua’s baseball team recently found out what a difference a day can make.

Within 24 hours, the Rough Riders were the victims of a five-inning 15-0 blowout and then produced a convincing 12-2 victory.

Their outcomes left them ironically with an overall 3-3 record as of then and it’s since fallen to 4-6 overall and 3-5 in the Colonial League as of Tuesday of this week.

“We’re young,” deadpanned veteran head coach Steve Bradley. “We have a bunch of guys who should be playing JV ball and they’re on varsity. We have to continue to grow up, and we’ll learn along the way.”

The Roughies may have left one slip away from them last Friday at Northwestern when the Tigers rallied for a pair of runs in the bottom of the fifth for a 4-2 victory. Starter senior Brandon Jenny allowed five hits, four runs with seven strikeouts and two walks over six innings.

“Brandon threw extremely well,” boasted Bradley. “It certainly wasn’t his fault. We couldn’t produce the runs for him when we needed to. We were up 2-0 going into the fifth.

“We had runners on second and third with two out late, and we popped up. We need to consistently string some hits together.”

Last Monday night at Southern Lehigh, the Roughies couldn’t get into gear. They fell behind 6-0 after two, 14-0 after the next inning and never recovered. Junior Bryann Rivera went two innings, and Catty was held to two hits.

“Bryann Rivera threw pretty good, but mental mistakes cost us in the third (inning),” said Bradley. “They hit the ball through their lineup.

“They also threw their ace, and we weren’t offensive enough to score.”

Last Tuesday afternoon, the Roughies rallied for a 12-2 home victory over Northern Lehigh, taking advantage of six Bulldog errors. Catty pieced together eight runs in the first inning, and they coasted the rest of the way.

Junior starter McKay Lewis allowed two runs on five hits over six innings. Lewis struck out six and walked one.

Junior Christian Fye went 2-for-4 with an RBI, sophomore John Pushkar was 2-for-5 with an RBI, and junior Dominic Gorr was 2-3 with an RBI in the Roughies’ 10-hit onslaught. The Roughs stole four bases.

“McKay had a nice outing for us,” added Bradley. “We needed to bounce back, and we were aggressive at the plate and on the basepaths.

“We showed what we are capable of doing.”

The Roughies were then edged by Salisbury Saturday (see story at right) and got beat by Notre Dame Monday.

“We have to work to be consistent,” noted Bradley. “We do have a shot at leagues and districts if we can play that way.”