SYRACUSE — A quick scheduling turnaround has seven Center State Conference schools hitting the field on Memorial Day to start Section III’s 2025 baseball playoffs.
Seeds were set for the six-class tournament Sunday, and championship games are scheduled for June 1-3 at Onondaga Community College. Class B Little Falls and Class D Oriskany from the Center State Conference enter postseason play in pursuit of third consecutive titles along with Class A Jamesville-DeWitt.
Oriskany’s Skyhawks (13-1), a No. 1 seed for for the second straight spring, defeated Little Falls’ Mounties (11-5) twice in regular-season crossovers as part of their current 12-game winning streak. Little Falls is seeded fifth.
Joining Oriskany and Jamesville-DeWitt as No. 1 seeds are Class AAA Baldwinsville, Class AA West Genesee, Class B Bishop Ludden of Syracuse and Class C Beaver River. Tri-Valley League rivals Proctor (11-5), Whitesboro (11-3) and New Hartford (11-3) are No. 2 seeds behind Baldwinsville, West Genesee and Jamesville-DeWitt, respectively; West Genesee beat Whitesboro in last spring’s AA final.
Bishop Ludden and Bishop Grimes enter the playoffs as high seeds with a merger looming for the 2025-26 academic year. Bishop Grimes is the No. 2 seed in Class C.
Class B Herkimer (8-6), and Class C Cooperstown (6-6), Waterville (7-7) and West Canada Valley (6-7) play preliminary home games Monday to pare their brackets down for Tuesday’s round of 16.
Herkimer junior Gavin Pizer shut out Clinton at home two weeks ago, and those teams meet again in Class B’s 16-vs.-17 game, with the winner heading to Syracuse Tuesday to face Bishop Ludden (11-7).
Elsewhere in Class B, Adirondack (4-14) is seeded 18th and travels to Hannibal (6-6) Monday, with the winner advancing to meet No. 2 Phoenix (10-6-1) Tuesday.
West Canada Valley is the highest Class C seed scheduled to play Monday — No. 13 — and hosts No. 20 DeRuyter (6-10-1). No. 15 Cooperstown hosts No. 18 Onondaga (4-11) while No. 16 Waterville squares off with Cato-Meridian (3-8) for the spot opposite Beaver River (13-3) Tuesday. Westmoreland (4-10) is the 19th seed and travels Monday to play at Thousand Islands (9-3).
Tuesday features a fuller schedule that includes quarterfinals for classes AAA, AA and A, while the quarterfinals for the smaller classes will be played Thursday. Semifinals will be played Friday and Saturday at Onondaga Community College, Auburn’s Falcon Park and Camden Middle School.