Staff photo / Preston Byers Canfield’s Cooper Walters celebrates after hitting a home run during Tuesday’s Little League District 2 Intermediate (50/70) championship at McCune Park in Canfield.

CANFIELD — It is not how you start, the saying goes, but rather how you finish. Fortunately for Canfield during Tuesday’s Little League Ohio District 2 Intermediate (50/70) championship game at McCune Park, it did both.

Canfield scored four runs in the first two innings and eight in the final two frames to pull away from Crestview 12-2 and advance to the state tournament.

“It’s part of the game. You never know what to expect,” Canfield coach Will Garrett said of the scoreless stretch in the middle for the game. “We planned on having multiple pitchers. Didn’t need to. Wasn’t expecting that. And yeah, there was, I wouldn’t say a lag in the game, but certainly people making good plays. Their pitcher was throwing very well. And then you just wait for that breakout moment. We had it, and I’m glad we did.”

Canfield, which won its first two games of the tournament by an average of 13 runs, immediately put Crestview on the back foot with three runs in the top of the first inning.

Noah Oles led off with a hit-by-pitch, and Kyle Davidson beat out a throw for an infield single before Rocco Turk drew a walk to load the bases. Cooper Walters then drove across the first run of the evening with an RBI single, and Anthony Costarella did the same to give Canfield a 2-0 lead. Turk soon scored on a wild pitch.

Crestview responded in the home half of the first with a pair of runs, courtesy of a Logan DuVall double to right field, which scored Blake Wendell, and a passed ball that allowed DuVall to score and make it a 3-2 game.

Canfield then added a run to its lead in the top of the second, during which Louis Coleman and Will Allen hit back-to-back doubles. Allen’s hit drove in Coleman to go ahead 4-2.

For much of the next four innings, neither team scored, as Canfield’s Turk and Crestview’s Owen Neiheisel dug in on the mound.

However, in the sixth inning, Crestview, having replaced Neiheisel the previous frame, surrendered a single and a walk before a game-altering, three-run home run by Turk. The Canfield hurler sent a pitch over the left-field fence to increase his team’s lead to 7-2.

The runs did not stop there either. Canfield loaded the bases and forced a pitching change before a bases-loaded walk and an outfield error scored two more runs.

Canfield iced the game in the top of the seventh when Turk doubled to score Canfield’s 10th run and Walters hit a two-run home run to make it 12-2.

“I expect amazing things from these kids, and they always seem to produce. So I wasn’t shocked by it,” Garrett said. “Maybe it came a little later than we were all expecting, but it came and it was a wonderful thing.”

With the loss, Crestview’s tournament run, which began with an opening loss to Austintown and followed with wins against Springfield, Austintown and Poland, ended Tuesday.

“I’m just happy we got to the district championship,” Crestview coach Jason Booth said. “We’re a small school, and we’re playing schools twice the size of us. I felt like the boys played hard this week. Hats off to Canfield, and hope they go forward.

“I just told the boys, ‘Listen, this is it, leave it all out there. You gotta fight, you gotta fight for everything.’ This is the biggest stage they’ve been (on) in their little young careers. And I said just keep fighting, get aggressive at the plate, and they did. Our luck just ran out tonight.”

Canfield, meanwhile, will head back to the state tournament in Wheelersburg. The tournament is set to begin on July 5.

“We’re playing baseball; we’re loving it. And when you have great teams like this to play against, I couldn’t ask for more,” Garrett said. “Representing Canfield, the kids are proud of that. … I was telling them, for a lot of these kids here, this is their first go with districts, and they got to experience that. The other ones, this is a repeat for them. Again, we’re going to look to do it at state, and we’re just going to look to have a good time while we’re doing it.”