Silver Creek’s Kaylee Hutchison delivers to the plate in the Black Knights 6-3 victory over Gowanda in Chautauqua-Cattaraugus Athletic Association Division 1 East action on Thursday. OBSERVER Photo by Braden Carmen

GOWANDA — In a game between Silver Creek and Gowanda in which both talented pitchers went the distance, the tying run came to the plate with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning.

As the sun set and the lights came on, Silver Creek needed one more out for a victory and head coach Justin Cerne stuck with his ace to get the job done. Finally, nine pitches later, Kaylee Hutchison rewarded her coach’s faith in her with a strikeout of Lily Bobseine to finish off the victory.

“She’s a player where it’s easy to have a lot of faith in her,” Cerne said of his senior ace.

The strikeout finished off a 6-3 win for the Black Knights in Chautauqua-Cattaraugus Athletic Association Division 1 East action at Gowanda High School.

Silver Creek (3-2, 1-1) scored a pair of runs in the first inning — as eight batters came to the plate — to give Hutchison the lead before she stepped into the circle.

“We took some gambles with our lineup yesterday and we kind of paid for it. I wasn’t sure how we were going to respond,” said Cerne, coming off an 8-7 loss to Forestville a night earlier. “What I’m most proud of is we kind of put it behind us quick. We came out firing today and everybody contributed.”

Gowanda (6-3, 2-1) responded by loading the bases in the bottom half of the inning, but Hutchison left all three runners stranded with a strikeout to end the frame.

“She’s a good pitcher, Hutchison. She can pitch,” Gowanda head coach Mike Maloney said.

Panthers pitcher Addison Kota settled down in the second inning with a quick 1-2-3 inning. In the top of the third inning, Hutchison showed off her wheels and manufactured a run to help her own cause with an infield single, a stolen base, and an eventual run scored on a wild pitch.

In the bottom of the third inning, Gowanda answered with the biggest number of any inning in the contest to tie the score at 3-3. Kota drove in the Panthers’ first run on an RBI triple. Ella Luther drove in Kota with a base hit through the left side of the infield, then Luther came in to score the tying run on an RBI double by Bobseine on a line drive that landed just fair down the left-field line. A ground ball back at Hutchison ended the inning and left both teams with a clean slate with four innings to play.

“It was just a big inning. The girls responded that inning, came back and scored some runs,” Maloney said. “Other than that, we didn’t hit. We scored in one inning; you’re not going to win a lot of games doing that.”

Each pitcher responded with a shutout fourth inning. Kota got a pair of strikeouts in her half-inning before stranding a runner on base with two outs. A pair of strong throws to first from shortstop Amber Lockwood closed out the bottom half of the inning for Silver Creek.

In the top of the fifth inning, Silver Creek did just what it did in the first inning — make Kota work. After a first-pitch leadoff single by Kyla Ziegler followed by a pair of walks, Silver Creek loaded the bases with nobody out. A wild pitch scored Ziegler for a 4-3 lead, then a blooper behind second base dropped to drive in a second run of the inning.

“They definitely stepped it up,” Hutchison said of her teammates.

“Grinding — that’s really what it was. We got hits at the bottom of our order and all the way around. We got lucky with some good base running. It was just grinding, nothing special. There were no monster hits, we were just chipping away at it,” Cerne said.

Silver Creek led 5-3 after the top of the fifth inning, then tacked on an insurance run in the top of the seventh inning for a second three-run lead of the game. The second time, Hutchison did not relinquish it.

“I knew I had to dial it in once we started getting into the higher innings,” Hutchison said. “Addison Kota, she really has a bat on her, so I had to dial it in and really step forward.”

The tying run came to the plate with one out in the bottom of the fifth inning, but Hutchison responded with a strikeout and a fly out to center field to end the frame. Then in the sixth inning, the tying runs were left stranded on base with a strikeout looking to end the inning.

Finally, in the bottom of the seventh inning, Gowanda brought the tying run to the plate for the third straight inning, in the form of Bobseine, whose double tied the game in the third inning.

“I’m glad we came back and fought that inning. We made her work for it,” Maloney said.

“I was about ready to lose my cool a little bit,” Hutchison joked. “I had a little bit of pressure on me, but I’ve been playing for years. I got the nerves out a little bit.”

Hutchison overcame the stress of the moment again and got out of trouble to punctuate the game with a strikeout that sealed the victory.

“It felt amazing,” Hutchison said of her 12th and final strikeout of the game. It finished off her sixth scoreless inning out of seven in the contest in the complete-game victory.

Silver Creek now looks ahead to a Saturday morning game at home against Pine Valley while Gowanda looks to bounce back on Monday against Falconer in Gowanda.