What could have been a disappointing week for the Harrison Wildcats baseball team, turned out to be an exhilarating one instead as the Cats won a sectional game with LaSalle last Thursday that puts them in the sectional title game this Thursday against Lakota West.

West reached the title game thanks to a 5-3 win over Hamilton last Friday. Harrison and West will match up Thursday 5 p.m. at Kings High School. Harrison junior A.J. Glines will take the mound for the Cats.

Glines was the winning pitcher in the 7-3 win over LaSalle, although he got relief from Cody Gwinner and Kyle Dipuccio.

The Harrison boys’ track team is limping home to the end of the season and last week’s seventh-place finish in the Southwest Ohio Conference (SWOC) meet is symbolic of what has been a tough season.

“We competed hard and I was happy with how we did individually,” said Harrison coach Scott Menze. “We just don’t have the power to compete with the big boys.”

Down 4-3 to McAuley in the fifth inning of their sectional softball game last Wednesday, the Harrison Ladycats rallied for two runs in the bottom of the fifth as senior Erica Knollman knocked in the winning run in Harrison’s 5-3 victory.

“We tried our best to give it away early,” said Harrison coach Tom Bill, whose team plays for the sectional title on Monday of this week against Seton at Hamilton High School. Only one of McAuley’s four runs was earned against Harrison pitcher Erin Engstrom.

The Harrison Ladycats scratched and clawed in the Southwest Ohio Conference (SWOC) girls’ track meet last week at Talawanda, but ultimately the Ladycats fell one point short of catching Northwest for second place. The Ladycats finished third as Talawanda won the league title.

“We looked at our lineup all week trying to find ways where we could score some points,” said Harrison coach Scott Menze. “Falling one point short was disappointing, but I’m proud of our effort. No one had a disappointing performance.”

Harrison had no individual champions, which Menze explains is one of the reasons the Ladycats didn’t finish higher.

“We’re a solid team with quality depth, but we don’t have any hammers that we know will go out there and win a couple of events,” he says.

A rainy week played havoc with softball schedules last week. The sectional tournament looms this week, but the Harrison Ladycats still have to wait to see if they will tie for first or second place in the Southwest Ohio Conference or slip all the way to fourth.

The Ladycats split two games with Edgewood and the Ladycats’ SWOC record now stands at 10-3. They currently are in a three-way tie with Edgewood and Wilmington, one game behind Ross, which has two league losses.

Matchups for the Harrison tennis team’s sectional tournament have been announced by the Southwest Ohio District Athletic Board.

The sectionals at Mason High School began Tuesday, May 14.

In singles, Kevin Kreinest gets a tough first-round match against Talawanda’s Alex Danielson. Danielson was recently named player of the year in the Southwest Ohio Conference.

Derek Reatherford matches up against Loveland’s Johan Harris and Ben Watson faces off against Andrew Beckerich of Milford.

On the doubles side, T.J. Stenger and Rick Seal team up against a doubles team from Talawanda, Andy Sens and Mason Miller. Jake Troutwine and Conner Davis take on Engel and Marty Fritsch from Hamilton.

It was not the week that Harrison baseball coach Shawn Sowders was hoping for. Sowders was looking forward to wrapping up the Southwest Ohio Conference title last week with a pair of wins over Edgewood and to get ready for this week’s sectional tournament action.

Rain forced cancellation of all but one game for the Cats last week, a 3-1 loss to Elder, and now the Cats hope to squeeze in the two remaining league games with Edgewood around the sectional tournament game Harrison hosts on Wednesday.

The National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame announced the members of the 2013 NFF Hampshire Honor Society, and Dartmouth had four of its student-athletes selected including tight end Justin Foley,

The honor society is comprised of college football players from all divisions of play who each maintained a cumulative 3.2 GPA or better throughout their college career.

With three powerful Catholic school teams in the meet, the Harrison girls’ track team took eighth place out of 10 teams in the Best of the West meet at Oak Hills last Thursday.

“It was a good meet with some great competition,” said Harrison coach Scott Menze. “We saw three schools from our league and a lot of teams from our district. We went in hoping to get some questions answered and I think we did.”

Senior Sammy Cliffe had another fine meet, placing in three individual events and in one relay team. Her best finish was in the 400 meters where she finished fourth with a time of 1:01.9.

The Harrison boys’ track team continues its struggles against good competition as the team finished eighth out of nine teams at the Best of the West meet at Oak Hills.

The good news is that four individuals and three relay teams placed in the competition, a dramatic increase over the previous week at the Ross Invitational.

“It’s been tough for the boys,” said Harrison coach Scott Menze.