SHERWOOD — It was a quick turnaround for Fairview’s ACME baseball team.

The Apaches’ varsity team just finished its best season in program history on Saturday, June 14, going a program-best 28-4 and playing in its first state semifinal in history, a 4-2 loss to Berlin Hiland at Thurman Munson Memorial Stadium in Canton.

Five days later, on Thursday, June 19, most of those players were playing ACME ball in a 7-1 victory against Napoleon at Apache Field in Sherwood.

And the Apaches still haven’t stopped winning.

Fairview (9-3), the District 7 champions, will play in a state quarterfinal against St. Henry (8-8), the District 4 champs, at 5 p.m. on Saturday at Holy Name Ballpark in Kalida. The winner advances to a state semifinal against the Lima Bath/Kalida winner 3:30 p.m. Sunday in Kalida.

“Any time that you can make a deep spring run like that, I think there’s a lot of excitement because the kids have a little taste of what the hard work and everything that they’ve put into this for so long has paid off for. And I think that’s part of it,” Fairview coach Andy Singer said. “But yeah, we had a very short turnaround.”

The Apaches have carried their momentum from the spring into the summer.

Fairview is batting .313 while plating 6.9 runs per game compared to .370 and 9.4 in the spring while the pitching staff has a 1.87 ERA and 1.18 WHIP compared to the spring staff’s 2.04 ERA and 1.24 WHIP.

The Apaches have won four of their last five games, including a 6-0 win over Montpelier in last Saturday’s District 7 district final, and has allowed three runs per game during that span.

Fairview also posted a 5-2 record during sectionals and districts, with its lone losses a pair of 1-0 losses to Wayne Trace in the double-elimination sectional tournament.

“We had a very tough tournament run with very good, talented teams with Wayne Trace, Edgerton, Montpelier,” Singer said. “The four of us, the last two years, have been the district (teams) out of our District 7, and any one of those teams would be a great representative from District 7. And it was nice to be able to come through to be able to get that.”

The day-to-day starters from the spring are helping continue Fairview’s momentum, headlined by Division VI All-Ohioans in incoming senior Elijah Arend and rising sophomore Anthony Singer.

Anthony Singer, an All-Ohio honorable mention, has a .385 batting average with a team-best 10 RBIs and nine runs while posting a 2.10 ERA and 1.13 WHIP with 18 strikeouts in 13 1/3 frames (four games) in 10 of Fairview’s 12 games.

Arend, a first-team All-Ohio pick at shortstop, has a 0.76 ERA, 0.71 WHIP and team-high 23 strikeouts across a team-best 18 1/3 innings and six games (three started) and has played in all 12 games.

Rising senior Gavin Palladino has a team-high .429 batting average with two homers and nine RBIs in eight games, incoming sophomore Shady Fritch is batting .382 with a team-high 15 runs in 12 contests and rising junior Jonah Shininger is batting .400 while posting team highs in ERA (0.66) and WHIP (0.66) in eight games.

And Fairview, which is also led by 2023 Fairview High School graduate Eli Shininger, is not just getting contributions from its everyday players in the spring.

Incoming freshman Calvin Kepler (.333 batting average, .524 OBP), who’s stepped up as a bottom of the lineup bat and has played second base across seven contests, and incoming sophomore Hunter Miller (.250, .400), who’s seen time at catcher while contributing in the bottom of the lineup in nine games, have been vital players this summer as well.

“We haven’t been at 100 percent as far as our team, because of vacations and other things going on. So we haven’t been all together,” Andy Singer said. “And to be successful from that aspect has been really exciting, because that means the other kids have had to step up.”

Other kids have also had to step up with six players from the spring picking up their high school diplomas in May, including outfielder Zane Timbrook (All-Ohio honorable mention), pitcher/infielder Cole Mack, pitcher Cash King and starting catcher Jesse Coolman.

“I feel like we have a lot of confidence from the seniors that led us there during the spring, and that just kind of carried us into this summer,” Jonah Shininger said after Saturday’s win over Montpelier.

St. Henry, meanwhile, is trying to keep its strong summer going after sputtering early in the playoffs during the spring.

St. Henry, which went 11-13 in the spring and was the No. 2 seed in the Division VI Coldwater District, lost 4-2 to seventh-seeded Parkway in a sectional final, which doubled as the first round of the tournament in the district.

But St. Henry has been rolling in its last four ACME games.

St. Henry is on a four-game winning streak, scoring 13 or 14 runs in three of those games, including a 14-7 victory over Coldwater in a District 4 district final. St. Henry also kept its opponents to two runs or less in the three games prior to its win over the Cavaliers.

St. Henry is also batting .288 with 6.8 runs per game, while the pitching staff has a 2.53 ERA and 1.49 WHIP.

Jake Schwieterman (.425 batting average, 11 RBIs, seven doubles, seven runs), Hudson Schmitz (.378 batting average, 11 runs, six RBIs) and Logan Schmitz (.375 batting average, seven runs) lead St. Henry’s offense.

Max Delzeith, Jack Buschur and Tate Boeckman have been St. Henry’s workhorses on the bump. Delzeith has tossed 36 innings (eight games) with a 1.56 ERA, 1.11 WHIP and 47 strikeouts, Buschur has thrown 24 2/3 frames (seven games) with a 3.69 ERA, 1.50 WHIP and 16 strikeouts and Boeckman has gone 18 innings (four games) with a 0.39 ERA, 1.06 WHIP and 18 strikeouts.

“Looking at them, they’re very competitive, and it should be a really good game,” Andy Singer said. “I think we have a lot of things that are comparable between the two of us with pitching depth as well as an offensive lineup that can manufacture runs.

“But I think they definitely got a couple of really strong hitters. We’re going to have to make sure that we try to pitch some of those weaknesses and try to find those weaknesses, because again it’s not somebody that we’re familiar with and that we play all the time, which is another neat thing about it.”

And to get ready for Saturday’s game, instead of having any spring-like practices in terms of intensity, some players had a batting practice on Wednesday while Fairview is hosting an alumni game at 6 p.m. Thursday at Apache Field. And throughout the summer, Andy Singer said they’ll host cookouts and take the team out for dinner.

It’s part of trying to lessen the workload for the kids, most of which are multi-sport athletes, which is a contrast to the past.

“When I first started, we had games every night of the week, except the night we would give for basketball open gyms and things,” Andy Singer said. “But the rest, we’d play, play, play. We tried to get 40 games in during the summertime. Those days have sort of came and gone.

“Now… there’s usually two, maybe three times a week that we’ll have games at night. And we’ve even tried to limit those down to say two five-inning games or a seven and a five to try and shorten it up some, still to get some work in.

“Because as I’ve always explained to previous coaches like football and others, for ACME, the summer is our second half of football games, when we can get those JV kids a chance to play at the varsity level, where as if you’re blowing somebody out on a Friday night, you can give those JV kids varsity experience every Friday. And we can’t do that, because in the spring time, our kids are always playing the same time the varsity is playing.”

And those players are trying to keep gaining experience and make it to Monday’s state championship.

“We’re looking to win it,” Palladino said after Saturday’s win over Montpelier.