SYRACUSE — The Wawasee baseball team can cross its first series of tests of the list for this season. The Warriors dove head first into their season with three straight games this week. Starting with a 14-0 win over Bethany Christian on Tuesday, Wawasee then played to a 5-5 tie with Wabash after six innings of play before seeing the game called for darkness.

The trio of season opening contests concluded Thursday evening with another game that would be called early for darkness, but this time the Warriors made sure to build a bigger lead. Wawasee escaped a rainy contest with Manchester to find a 14-10 victory at the end of the rainbow before heading into spring break.

Manchester didn’t make it easy for Wawasee, the Squires opened up the game scoring three runs in the top of the first inning. Wawasee was faced with adversity right off the bat, as it was against Wabash when the Apaches opened up an early 2-0 lead.

“We came out a little lackadaisical tonight,” said Wawasee head coach Brent Doty. “Last night was different from tonight because of the weather. We didn’t know if we were going to play or not tonight so the guys weren’t really ready to go. I told the guys after the first that we had to pick it up because those kind of start will kill us in conference play.”

Chase Rookstool got the message loud and clear. The senior went yard with a two-run blast, scoring himself and Lucas Garza, to bring the Warriors within one of the Squires on the scoreboard at 3-2. An RBI from David McAtee gave Manchester a 4-2 lead in the top of the second, but the Warriors broke the game open in their half of the inning.

Wawasee scored eight runs in the bottom half of the second to build a 10-4 lead. The home team did the damage on just three hits.

Rieder Hunley and Garza each had a double, which collectively brought in three runs. A single from Jacob Garcia scored two more while the other three runs were scored on errors by the Squires.

Wawasee had eight hits as a team. Jamie Slabaugh, Garcia, Garza and Rookstool all tied for the team lead with two hits each. Hunley and Gavin Bontrager had a hit each for the Warriors as well. Rookstool was the true offensive powerhouse for the Doty’s squad Thursday night as the senior had, in addition to his two hits, a pair of RBIs and scored three runs.

“It’s always a team effort,” Doty offered. “Anytime you get a win its because of what the team did but tonight we had a couple of guys stand out. Chase hit the ball really well tonight and I thought we got a god pitching performance out of (Harrison) Shortill once he settled in. Garza was another guy that impressed offensively. Defensively I’ve been impressed with what our outfield has done so far this year.”

In the bottom of the third Bontrager knocked home two runs while Slabaugh brought another runner in to build Wawasee’s lead to 14-6. Slabaugh led Wawasee with three RBIs.

The Squires but cut that lead in half over the next two innings but ran out of daylight. The game ended with a called third strike on a pitch from Bontrager.

Grant Strobel and David McAtee led the Squires with a pair of RBIs each. McAtee led all players with four runs scored. Bailey Ness led the visiting squad with three hits.

Wawasee will travel to East Noble once it returns from spring break on April 11.

The junior varsity contest between the two schools at Manchester was cancelled.