By Randy Whitehouse,Staff Writer

STANDISH – For the second-seeded Poland Knights, getting on base against Gorham ace Mark Schmidt was the easy part. It’s when the Knights got runners on that things too often went awry.

Two crucial pickoffs allowed Schmidt to outduel his Poland counterpart, Alex Smith, as the undefeated and top-seeded Rams earned their first Western Class B championship since 1998 with a 2-1 victory Tuesday at a drenched Larry Mahaney Diamond.

The Knights (17-2) put the ball in play against the hard-throwing southpaw (two strikeouts), and out-hit the Rams (19-0), 7-5. But Gorham, which was playing its final game in Western B before moving up to Class A next year, one-upped Poland in a game of small-ball.

“Striking out (twice) against a guy like that, I was very proud of how our boys went up there and hit the ball,” Poland coach Dave Jordan said. “Alex did a great job against a very good hitting team. I wish we could have played under better conditions, but all year long we’ve said No excuses, we’ll go out and play in whatever conditions with whatever we have.’ Today we did. They just came out on top.”

Both teams squandered early chances in a moderate drizzle. Poland hit into a double play that squelched a two-on, one out opportunity in the first. Gorham stranded runners in scoring position in each of the first two innings.

The rain let up briefly during a 25-minute rain delay before the bottom of the third. Poland took a 1-0 lead in the fifth on Joe Douglass’ clutch two-out single to left that scored Stevie Ray. The Knights might have gotten another run out of the rally, though, had Tyler Merchant, who led off the inning with a single, not been the first victim of Schmidt’s deceptive pickoff move.

“We know it’s good. We know exactly what he does. We just didn’t pick up on it,” Jordan said.

The Rams finally got to Smith (six innings, nine Ks, two walks) after he issued a leadoff walk to Craig Nicely to start the fifth. Nicely moved to second on a balk, to third on a passed ball and scored on John Burnheimer’s flair single to right. Following a Jake Blaisdell single, Burnheimer advanced to third on Schmidt’s sacrifice fly to center, then scored the winning run when a Smith pitch got past catcher Jeremy Callahan and went to the backstop.

“That was probably great for us, that we got down by one, because that really got us up and got us going. Our team really responds to that,” Schmidt said.

“Coming into the game, we knew Gorham was going to be a tough team.” Smith said. “We knew whoever played the soundest game was going to get the win, and I guess they came out on top.”

The Knights got the tying and go-ahead runs on in the sixth on a Jason Lehr single and an error with one out, but Schmidt worked out of it with a fly out to center and a ground out back to the mound.

“I think (the conditions) affected Schmidt a little more than Smith. Smith was a bull out there,” Gorham coach Rocky Myers said. “Sometimes in this weather, it helps to have that off-speed stuff he has.”

Poland threatened again in the seventh. With one out, Schmidt hit Eric Picard, then promptly picked him off first. He then got Douglass swinging to end the game.

Schmidt said he developed the move by watching Andy Pettitte and other big league lefties and working on it in backyard Wiffleball games. Gorham assistant coach Colin Loveless, a former Oxford Hills star who had a wicked pickoff move of his own, helped him perfect it.

“He gave me some mind tricks to use, because I always used to use my best move,” Schmidt said. “He let me know that I should mix it up, so that when they think they’ve already seen my best move, I can pick them off with what is actually my best move.”

Poland played the game without its top hitter and first baseman Max Levine, who was participating in a national debate competition. He and Smith are two of five seniors that they graduate from what was by far the most successful season in the program’s history.

“We’re building a tradition,” Jordan said. “We had four seniors out here today, out of 18 guys. So we’re looking forward to getting a lot of these guys back and trying to get back out here next year.”