ARCHBOLD — Wauseon’s baseball team backed Napoleon into a corner early on in Wednesday’s Division IV district semifinal at Archbold’s Memorial Park by taking a 3-0 lead through 2 1/2 innings.

But the Wildcats scratch and clawed to get back in it, and their resiliency kept their season alive.

Napoleon scored a run in the third, fourth and fifth innings to get within one of the Indians. Cal Bickel then launched a game-tying RBI triple to right field in the bottom of the seventh and Eric Hersberger hit a walk-off single to right with the bases loaded to lift top-seeded Napoleon to a 5-4 victory.

“We were kind of down in our heads the whole game. Didn’t really win an inning over them,” Hershberger said. “We came into that inning like, ‘We’re going to win this one.’

“We did.”

Bickel, with Napoleon trailing 4-3, drilled his right-field triple to score No. 3 hitter Trey Rubinstein, who reached via a fielder’s choice and got to second on a wild pitch to round out his 3-for-4 (three singles) night that included three runs.

Blaine Ford was then hit in the head by a pitch and Mason Trausch, who delivered a two-out RBI single up the middle in the fifth to cut Wauseon’s lead to 4-3, was intentionally walked to load the bases for the Wildcats (19-6-1).

Then Hershberger came up clutch.

With the infield and outfield in, Hersberger bashed a flyball single over the right fielder’s head to keep Napoleon’s season going and to conclude a contest that was delayed an hour-and-a-half due to rain.

“They said they were going to intentionally walk Trauschy in front of me, and I was like, ‘You know what, I’m going to walk it off right here,'” Hershberger said. “I did. I was confident.”

But the sixth-seeded Indians, who ended the season 10-13, put pressure on the Wildcats early.

No. 5 hitter Kahle Albright drilled a line-drive, two-run double to right with two outs in the top of the first to put Wauseon up 2-0.

Leadoff hitter Caleb Kissel, who went 2-for-3 (two singles) with three runs, then took off for home after Braylon Miller slid in safely at second via an error on a stolen base in the third, extending the Indians’ edge to 3-0.

Kissel touched home for the third time of the game in the fifth via a fielding error on Max Russell contact with two outs to give Wauseon a 4-2 lead.

“That’s the best team in our district, I think the best team in our region — I think they have a chance to go on and make a run at state,” said Indians coach Trent Thomas, whose team entered Wednesday on a five-game winning streak. “Our kids fought their butts off the last two weeks and just kept believing.

“And I thought we deserved to win the game. We had some things not go our way, and they took advantage of it. Kudos to them (Napoleon). They’re a senior-laden team, and they never gave up. They just kept grinding. But I love our guys, and we just kept competing.”

Owen Espinoza, who reached first via an error on a close call to start the bottom of the seventh, earned the complete-game win. He fired 11 strikeouts while allowing four unearned runs, four hits and two walks while having a good mix of off-speed pitches and fastballs.

Bickel and Hershberger each went 2-for-4, with Hershberger adding another single in the second inning and Bickel contributing a third-inning single.

Napoleon also had five errors compared to Wauseon’s three.

“Give Wauseon a lot of credit. We played them a couple weeks ago (17-4 win on May 10), and the resolve that they played with and the character that they played with, they pushed us to the absolute limit today. So you got to give a lot of credit to them,” Wildcats coach Eric Sprague said. “But our guys found a way. 

“This was very similar to a situation last year in the district tournament for us, where we got down several runs to Bryan, and we found a way to kind of scratch and claw back and a couple plays went our way. That’s the game of baseball.”

Miller, who went 1-for-2 (single) and scored on Albright’s double, suffered the loss in relief for Wauseon. He went 1 1/3 innings with two strikeouts, two runs, two hits, two walks and a hit batter.

Cam Sherman started for the Indians and went five frames, fanning four batters with three runs (two earned), eight hits and three walks while using a heavy dosage of off-speed pitches.

“These kids, the grit they’ve showed and the growing up. We’re pretty young, and we got off to an awful start (1-6), but they kept coming to work,” Thomas said. “And these young men, they’re going to be able to take that with them the rest of their lives, because there’ll be bad things that happen in their lives and will have to push through it.”

Napoleon next plays in a district final against the winner of No. 2 Millbury Lake/No. 4 Ottawa-Glandorf at 5 p.m. on Friday in Archbold.

Lake and O-G’s district semifinal, which was played Wednesday night at Archbold, did not finish before publishing deadline.