The high school baseball season is nearly two weeks old, and it has been a wild start for Northwestern Lehigh.

The Tigers were supposed to have played five games by now, but only three of them have been completed. Their game against Blue Mountain was tied 8-8 after eight innings when it was suspended until April 15. A game against Southern Lehigh was rained out.

Two of the three completed games went eight innings, including Friday night’s battle against Salisbury that was won on a walk-off single by senior Sam Mauro that gave the Tigers a 4-3 win.

The win was also a good sign for the Northwestern (2-0 Colonial, 3-0 overall) lineup since it was the bottom of the lineup that did the damage for the Tigers after they struggled to find hits in the early going. The six through nine hitters in the order went 4-for-11 (.364) with two RBI and four runs scored, while drawing five walks in the game.

“The bottom of our order has been struggling, so it was good to see them get going tonight,” said Tiger head coach Chad Cooperman. “We knew they would come around and they did it at the right time tonight.”

In addition to driving in the last run of the game, Mauro figured into the first run of the game in the bottom of the third.

Freshman Shane Hulmes led off the inning with a walk against starter Owen Fogel and Mauro followed that up with a ground ball to short that was botched, putting runners on first and third. A fielder’s choice by Justin Augustus drove in the first run of the game. After a walk to Eli Zimmerman, Owen Fogel rebounded to get the next two batters and get out of further trouble in the inning.

An inning later, Cannon Fitch drew a two-out walk and courtesy runner Wes George stole second ahead of Hulmes’ second single of the game, which drove in George to make it 2-0. Fogel then lost his control and walked three straight hitters to force across a third run for Northwestern.

In the fifth, Tigers starter Chase Moyer ran into some issues of his own when he walked the first two batters and Mike Stauffer singled to make it 3-1. Another walk and a fielder’s choice pushed across the second run before Moyer picked up an out on a fly ball to Aidan Freeman in right, but a ground ball single to left, suddenly tied the score 3-3.

Neither team was able to push a run across and after a leadoff single for Salisbury (0-1, 1-2) in the top of the eighth, reliever Shaun O’Donnell got Jake Bucchin to line into a double play and then struck out Fogel to end the inning.

In the bottom of the inning, Austin Eisenhard led off with a double to center field and Fitch looked to sacrifice courtesy runner George to third, but instead, reached first safely with George remaining at second.

Hulmes then bunted back to the mound for the first out before Mauro stepped to the plate and slapped a line drive to center on an 0-1 pitch to bring in George with the game winning run.

“Winning late games like this will help us because we’re learning how to win these close, tough games,” said Cooperman. “I wish we would be able to put some of these teams away earlier and make it a little easier on ourselves, but our guys are coming through for us.”

Moyer threw four innings, striking out six, and Josh Lichman added a shutout inning for Northwestern. O’Donnell (2-0, 2.53) threw the final three innings, allowing a hit and a walk with three strikeouts to get the win. Thomas Lovelidge took the loss for the Falcons in three innings of work.

Lichman has had the hot bat for Northwestern early on, leading the team in average (.429), hits (6), and doubles (3). Eisenhard leads in on-base percentage (.667) and slugging percentage (.800), while O’Donnell leads with five stolen bases and leads all pitchers with a 2.52 ERA and two wins. Robert Croneberger leads the team with seven RBI and George leads with five runs scored.