WAYNESBORO, Pa. — The 2026 high school baseball season gets underway on Friday, and the Waynesboro Indians will host the Central Dauphin Rams at 4:30 p.m. in a District 3-6A first-round playoff game.
Tribe senior pitcher John Kahl will get the start on the mound. He’s no stranger to pitching in the playoffs. He had a strong outing last season against Cedar Cliff. He pitched into the late innings of a game that was halted due to lightning and didn’t pitch the next day. The Colts won 2-1 and went on to win the state championship.
Waynesboro (16-4) enters the postseason as the third seed. Central Dauphin (9-10) is the 14th seed.
Tickets are $8. No passes will be accepted. Tickets can be purchased online at https://events.hometownticketing.com/event/c240fb92-d770-4c99-891b-8c8a09fc92f8.
“They have a solid pitching staff,” said Waynesboro head coach Travis Hardman, whose team is in the playoffs for the third straight season. “We have our work cut out for us. Their strength of schedule tells you a lot. They don’t have a weak opponent on their schedule. They’ve been in a lot of tight ball games. They lost some games at the end of the season, which affects their seeding. If things go their way, they are a much higher seed. They are much better than a 14th seed.”
Seven of CD’s 10 losses were by two runs or less.
Chase Shrader, a senior, has appeared in 11 games. He boasts a 0.76 earned run average (ERA). Nick Tirado pitched a one-hitter in a 2-0 win over Cedar Cliff recently and gives the Rams a solid one-two punch from the position.
Hardman trusts Kahl to get the job done.
“He’ll be ready,” said Hardman. “He’s pitched in big games before.”
Kahl is a no-nonsense hurler who doesn’t believe in taking a lot of time between pitches. His ball-to-strike ratio is solid, and he won’t give up a lot of runs because he controls the outcome of a lot of at-bats.
Waynesboro’s defense is usually up to the task, though the Indians were roughed up in the fifth inning against Carlisle on Monday, May 11. The Thundering Herd scored seven runs and benefited from two errors, a hit batsman and a walk, along with five hits.
“It’ll be a close game if we play the game we play,” Hardman said. “That inning we played the other day can’t happen. We had some errors and gave up some hits, and Carlisle had a big inning. We’ve gone through stretches this year when the defense plays well. It’s hard to play a perfect game.”
But as they have done all season, the Tribe rallied for a 10-9 win, thanks to a monster offensive performance by third baseman Ryan Jenkins. Jenkins went 5 for 5, including two home runs, eight runs batted in, and two runs scored.
Jenkins has been hitting like this all season. He boasts a .523 batting average (44 hits in 64 at-bats).
