Clearfield's Mandy Rowles is congratulated by head coach Bob Dixon after smacking her second solo home run during the Lady Bisons 5-1 win over Curwensville. (Photo by Jim Butler)

Rowles' teammates weren't too shabby either.

The Lady Bisons touched up Curwensville started Holly Lansberry for five runs on nine hits and made several stalwart defensive plays to rebound nicely from Tuesday's home loss to Punxsutawney.

"We're going to check the ID's on these girls, because that wasn't the team I had out there the first two games," Clearfield head coach Bob Dixon said. "(Tuesday) night when I went home, I was real disappointed in our performance. I was planning on having a real tough practice Thursday night and maybe read them the riot act because we weren't aggressive at the plate the first two games."

"We came out against Curwensville and we were swinging the bats against a dang good pitcher - probably one of the best in the state. We hit the ball well. We played defense. The couple errors we had were aggressive errors. This is a talented group. We have to focus and come prepared, and when we do we can play like this."

The game was scoreless through three innings, as both Lansberry and Rowles were cruising through the opponent's lineup.

But that all changed with one mammoth swing of the bat in the top of the fourth.

Rowles connected on Lansberry's first offering of the inning and sent it well beyond the left field fence to give Clearfield a 1-0 lead.

"As soon as she hit that, I said there's one (run)," Dixon said. "She really stroked that. She's one of the most powerful hitters in central Pennsylvania, if not the state. She can long ball with anybody. When she hits them, they do sail."

Clearfield stayed aggressive at the plate as Julie Colesar followed Rowles' shot by hitting the first pitch she saw from Lansberry past a diving Shannon McDonald at shortstop and into left field.

Alyssa Anderson and Suzie Colesar made it four hits in a row with consecutive singles. Suzie Colesar knocked in her sister Julie with a base hit to right, making it 2-0. Anderson scored three batters later when Alanna Luzier took an outside pitch the other way for an RBI single.

The four straight hits for the Lady Bisons was one more than they had all game against Punxsutawney.

"Our bats have been struggling, but we finally picked it up and came together as a team," Rowles said.

"I knew they wouldn't play like they did (Tuesday) night," Curwensville head coach Allen Leigey said. "This is a backyard brawl. These girls play together in the summertime, They know each other. It doesn't matter what sport you play them in, how well you played the day before doesn't matter. They're going to come and play hard."

Clearfield added a run in the fifth when Ashley Lias doubled down the left field line, moved to third on a double steal and scored when Tide third baseman Jenessa Stiles couldn't handle the throw from catcher Ashley Demchak.

Rowles' second big fly of the game came in the top of the seventh with two out.

"We were trying to stay away from her," Leigey said. "We wanted to stay outside and not give her anything. But she hit a fastball outside and cranked it, and she hit the change. She's a good hitter. Sometimes the hitter wins and sometimes the pitcher wins. Today the hitter won."

Rowles was just as effective in the circle, allowing just a seventh-inning run. She gave up five hits, walked none and struck out seven.

"She located well tonight," Dixon said. "We talked before the game about when she throws her curve ball, we talked about being more of a finesse pitcher. We wanted her to take a little off so it could bite in and get a better break on it. She threw some real nice curveballs."

"I play with most of the girls in summer ball, so I really wanted to win this one," Rowles said.

Curwensville avoided the shutout when Stiles smacked a sharp single to right field, moved to second and third on a pair of passed balls and scored on a Stacey Johnson sacrifice fly. Sara Clark followed with a triple, but was stranded as Rowles struck out Morgan Peterman to end the game.

"If it only would have been 3-1, maybe the triple would have put some pressure on them," Leigey said. "But at 5-1 there was no pressure. "We swung at too many bad pitches early. I think we could have gotten some baserunners if we were just a little more selective and would have taken a couple pitches. It would have put us in better situations."

Clearfield got a pair of big defensive plays from right fielder Amber Mahlon.

She ran down a fly ball deep in the right field corner that was foul and barely still in the field of play, making a one-handed stab to retire Demchak with McDonald on first and nobody out in the fourth inning. Mahlon ran down another ball in right field in the sixth, this time robbing Tess Bloom of a leadoff hit.

"She made some long runs and she uses one hand, and we keep preaching to use two hands," Dixon said. "But hey, she gets to the ball. She covers a lot of ground for us. She's a little unorthodox, but she can travel. That one she caught down the line was real impressive."

Lansberry surrendered five runs - three earned - on nine hits. She struck out eight batters and walked none.

The nine hits given up ties a career-high for Lansberry. She surrendered nine to Brockway in 2006 in her varsity debut. The three earned runs is the most surrendered since the 2006 District 9 title game against Elk County Catholic when she allowed four. Lansberry only gave up 10 earned runs in 25 games last season.

"We got behind in the count a lot and when you get behind it's tough," Leigey said. "We were always trying to fight back. We never worry about her walking too many batters because she's always around the plate. But I thought she threw well. We didn't give her the defense behind her that we should have, and we didn't stick the ball."

Clearfield improved to 1-2, while Curwensville fell to 1-1.

"I told the girls that (loss) was going to help us," Leigey said. "You don't know what kind of team you have until you face a little adversity. And I keep telling them they're going to get everybody's "A" game. No matter what, they're going to want to come in here and knock us off. That's probably not fair, because this isn't the same team. But it's the cards we're dealt with having so much success.

"Clearfield's good. And we need to play teams like that regardless of winning or losing. It makes us better."

Curwensville plays host to ECC today. Clearfield travels to St. Marys Friday.

Clearfield-5
Luzier 2b 4011, Butler 3b 4000, Lias ss 4110, Rowles p 4222, J. Colesar 1b 4120, Anderson cf 3120, S. Colesar dp 2011, McGovern c 3000, Kovalick lf 3000, Mahlon (flex) rf 0000. Totals: 31-5-9-4.

Curwensville-1
Lansberry p 3000, Bloom cf 3000, McDonald ss 3010, Demchak c 3000, Jenessa Stiles 3b 3110, Haney dp 3000, Johnson 1b 2011, Clark lf 3020, Peterman 2b 2000, McKeown ph 1000, Bressler (flex) rf 0000. Totals: 26-1-5-1.

Score by Innings
Clearfield                      000   310   1-5   9   2
Curwensville                  000   000   1-1   5   3

Errors-Butler, Lias; Stiles 2, McDonald. LOB-Clearfield 6, Curwensville 5. 2B-Lias. 3B-Clark. HR-Rowles 2. SAC-S. Colesar. SF-Johnson. SB-Lias, J. Colesar. CS-McDonald (by McGovern). WP-Rowles; Lansberry 2. PB-McGovern 2.

Pitching
Clearfield: Rowles-7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 SO.
Curwensville: Lansberry-7 IP, 9 H, 5 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 8 SO.

WP-Rowles (1-2). LP-Lansberry (1-1).
Time-1:29.