Fannett-Metal (3-1) travelled to Loysburg to take on Northern Bedford in an ICC cross conference contest and suffered their first loss of the season to the Black Panthers. 

The Tigers were rolling along building a 3-0 lead after three innings of play while the Black Panthers had yet to have a runner get to first base. In the 4th inning the weather took a turn for the worse, and so did the Tigers defense as the Black Panthers sent 9 batters to the plate in the bottom of the 4th inning.  A leadoff error followed by a Reese Musselman double plated the first run.  A single by Bowers scored Musselman when the ball was dropped at the plate.  After a groundout, Bowers scored on a sac fly to tie the game. Two straight singles, a hit by pitch and a passed ball pushed the go ahead run across the plate. ” You can’t give a quality team like NBC any life and we certainly did that in the 4th inning.  We have to be better there.”, Coffman said.  

Tigers pitcher Landon Arnold suffered the loss in a duel against NBC left handed ace Reese Musselman.  Arnold sat the Black Panthers down in order in 5 of 6 innings.  He threw 75 pitches with 48 going for strikes.  He gave up 5 hits, 4 runs(all unearned), 6 K and 1 HBP.  Musselman tossed all 7 innings and reached 100 pitches on the last out of the game.  He had 7 K, 1 HBP, 1 BB, 6 hits and 3 Earned runs.  His defense played errorless ball behind him.  

The Tigers put up two quick runs in the first inning.  Jake Coffman got things started with a leadoff single up the middle.  Landon Arnold then launched a two run shot to right to put the Tigers up 2-0.  The Tigers stranded a runner in the second inning but extended the lead to 3-0 in the 3rd.  Wade Appleby singled and scored on a Broc Hostler RBI double.  A strikeout ended the inning.  The Tigers offense was stymied by Musselman the rest of the way as he allowed only one base hit in the final four innings.  “It was good for us to see a solid pitcher and we made good contact at the plate. This was a tough loss but hopefully it will make us tougher moving forward”, Coffman said.  

Offensively, Arnold had two hits on the day, a single and a home run.  Hostler and Noah Naugle had doubles.  Coffman and Appleby had singles.  

The Tigers have three games next week. They host Southern Huntingdon on Tuesday at 4:30, host Everett on Thursday at 4:30, and travel to Claysburg on Friday for a 6:00 start.