BOW – In a crucial game for playoff seeding, Bow’s senior pitcher Nate Kiah stood strong on the mound and delivered a full game with eight strikeouts to earn the Falcons a 3-1 win over Kingswood. 

The Falcons (13-2) entered the game with an eight-game win streak, but still had to fight for every run as they looked to secure a home playoff game next week. With the win over the Knights (11-4), Bow ensured a top-four finish with one game left to go.

“This was the difference between the three seed and the five seed,” he said. “I felt good. I love pitching against good competition, and I felt great today.”

From the get-go, Kiah’s afternoon on the mound was imperiled by Kingswood’s base runners. Early in the first, he was forced to cover home and made a very close tag on the Knights’ sliding Nate Cloos to keep the score at zero.

He held them scoreless until the sixth inning, when Cloos got on base with a bunt, stole second and was driven home with a single by Hayden Eastman. Besides that small blip, he held down his spot and secured his team a home playoff game.

Fortunately for Kiah and the Falcons, their offense started hot and responded quickly to Kingswood and went ahead by two in the bottom of the first and had some breathing room.

With two outs in the first, junior first baseman Jake Reardon took a walk and was pushed to third thanks to a double by senior Brady Lover. On the next at-bat, senior Dillan Abbate hit a ground ball to third, but the throw to first missed and allowed both Reardon and Lover to score.

Later, in the bottom of the sixth, another erroneous throw, this time to third, led to sophomore Chase Crowell getting the third run for the Falcons.

Head coach Ben Forbes was happy with his team’s defensive performance, which was nearly impeccable except for a few missed opportunities, and with Kiah’s performance. However, his team stranded 10 batters and could have been sharper offensively.

“I love our defense. They’re always really good. Especially today, I pitch for contact, and having good defense behind me, I love it,” Kiah added.

When the playoffs come around, it will be single elimination, and making sure those bats get hot will be crucial to defending the title. The Falcons are experienced and are feeling the playoff competition brewing, according to Forbes – they just have to step up to the occasion.

“We’ve got to execute that, and then, continuing to play good defense and get the quality pitching that we have all season, but the biggest thing is, we can’t let down. We have to build momentum,” Forbes said.

After keeping the streak alive and adding one more win to the total, the Falcons will travel to Lebanon for a 4 p.m. game on Friday before the playoffs kick off next week.

Alexander Rapp can be reached at arapp@cmonitor.com