With a shot at a share of the Wasaren League title on the line, the Hoosick Falls baseball team showed up ready to play Thursday afternoon against league-leading Granville.

Josh Mulready literally ran through a wall for his team Thursday afternoon, making this great grab in the first inning to rob Granville's Connor Hoagland of a home run. (Photo by J.S. Carras - The Record).

Josh Mulready took one of the oldest lines in the book of coach clichés to heart Thursday afternoon in the biggest game of the season so far for the Hoosick Falls High School baseball team.

For head coach Mike Lilac Jr. and sophomore starting pitcher Cody LaFlamme, he literally ran through a wall.

LaFlamme walked Granville’s Kyle Rathburn to open the game and Connor Hoagland followed, ripping a towering fly ball to left center field. Mulready, Hoosick Falls’ fearless sophomore center fielder, raced for the ball and caught it just as he collided with the outfield fence.

Thanks to that catch, LaFlamme carried a no-hit bid into the fifth inning and finished with six strikeouts in a complete-game performance. Adam Ferrannini, forced into the starting lineup because of injuries and illness to regular Panthers starters, drove in two runs in the second inning and scored the game-winner in the fifth, lifting Hoosick Falls to a 4-2 Wasaren League victory on its home field.

For the full story, read Friday's edition of The Record. For a video, scroll down.

Cody LaFlamme gets ready to throw a pitch during Thursday's game against Granville. He went the distance, scattering two runs and striking out six to earn the complete game win. (Carras photo).

Friday, Hoosick Falls (10-3, 12-4) travels to Greenwich (10-3, 15-4) for the Wasaren League finale. Whichever team wins will tie Granville (11-3, 17-3) for the regular season title. Schuylerville (9-3, 12-6) also remains in the title hunt.

The Panthers, however, will be without starting shortstop Tanner Williams, who recently broke his hand. Third baseman Seth Foster, who was ejected from Thursday's game, will also have to sit out one more game by Section II rules.

Hoosick Falls junior catcher Mike Brewster has been a calming influence behind the plate for a mostly young Panthers team in 2010. (Montgomery vidcap).

Having played on the Panthers' New York State Class C semifinalist football team and the Section II Class C finalist basketball in the winter, Mike Brewster had an interesting perspective on how the baseball team has exceeded all expectations in 2010.

"You just apply what you learn from other sports to other sports," Brewster said. "It’s a lesson of life, really. You’re going to be dealt bad stuff during life and how do you react? Cody reacted in a great way. He pitched a great game."

It will be interesting to see how the Panthers stack up in the Section II playoffs. They're likely to garner a high seed and with LaFlamme on the mound, anything looks possible for them. Can they use some of this late-season momentum to carry them to yet another Section II title game for the 2009-10 season?

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Hoosick Falls senior forward Kevin McMahon (left) is passing the torch this season to sophomore point guard Alex Lilac (right). The Panthers travel to Granville Friday night for a crucial Wasaren League contest. (Photos by J.S. Carras - The Record).

The Hoosick Falls boys basketball team, of course, is leaning on senior forward Kevin McMahon, the reigning Wasaren League MVP. McMahon also owns schools records in blocks. All of them. Game, single season and career, McMahon is a once-in-a-lifetime defender for Hoosick Falls and a 6-foot-6 he's got an unstoppable inside-outside offensive game as well.

Mike Brewster and Hutton Rasmus also add veteran experience for Hoosick Falls, but the Panthers, defending Wasaren League champions, are really relying on a trio of sophomores.

Tanner Williams, John Hayden and Alex Lilac, son of head coach Mike Lilac Jr., have all shone so far on the court, leading the Panthers to a 6-0 record in Wasaren League games. Hoosick Falls travels to Granville Friday night for a big-time matchup with the 6-1 Golden Horde at 7:30 p.m.

Alex Lilac works on his defense during a drill in practice Thursday afternoon at Hoosick Falls High School.

Lilac has handled the bulk of the offensive duties for the Panthers this year - he's a distributor and a three-point threat.

Tanner Williams, who made an impact in the secondary for the Panthers' football team in 2009, is Hoosick Falls' designated defender, drawing the opponent's top guard every game. He'll have his hands full with Granville's Connor Hoagland tonight, who scores over 10 points a game - an exorbitant amount in the Wasaren League.

Senior forward Kevin McMahon catches a pass in practice Thursday afternoon at Hoosick Falls.

For more on the Panthers, check out Friday's edition of The Record.

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Nick Knauer was the hero for the Tamarac High School wrestling team Thursday night, winning a 7-2 decision in the final match of Tamarac's contest against Granville. The Bengals were trailing by two points heading into Knauer's match, but wound up winning, 40-39.

It was the first Wasaren League regular season title in school history for Tamarac.

In other news, senior Jake Oswald reached win No. 106 Thursday night, drawing to within two victories of the Tamarac school record of 108, set by Joe Uccellini in 1998.

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It's a big step forward for the Tamarac High wrestling program, which like the girls volleyball program, will be hanging a new banner in the gym sometime soon. The volleyball team won its first league title this fall.

The Bengals have to give a good portion of the credit to head wrestling coach Erick Roadcap, who modestly called himself "a one-man show" when he phoned in the results Thursday night.

It takes a ton of work to be a wrestling coach, just take last weekend's Joe McCabe Invitational at Maple Hill for example. Coaches showed up Friday night for a seeding meeting and had to return with their teams for weigh-ins at 8 a.m. Saturday morning. Matches continued all day and the finals did not start until after 7 p.m.

And then the bus ride home.

Watervliet girls basketball coach Gordie Johnson told me Monday afternoon how he and wrestling coach Dennis Lane see each other in the summer at the school and joke about the offseason.

Johnson said he cuts Lane some slack and ends practices a few minutes early the day of wrestling matches. Lane needs time to pull out the bleachers and lay down the mats and set up the scorers tables....and on and on it goes.

It's easy to envision the gym rat basketball player spending all their waking hours working on jump shots and foul shots, but plenty of wrestlers - and their coaches - are putting in just as much work, if not more, for far less attention. It's a sport based on dedication and discipline above all and the folks at Tamarac should be proud their wrestlers were the best in the Wasaren League this season - with plenty of things left to accomplish before the season is over.