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Until now.

"I missed all of playoffs last year; I'm basically pitching for the first time in a year," the Damascus Post 171 southpaw said. "My curve is finally coming back. I threw it today in counts where they were expecting fastballs, and that caught them off guard."

McMahon held Gaithersburg Post 104 to one run on three hits Thursday in a 3-1 Damascus win at Kelley Park.

All three hits were doubles, two by catcher Ben Silverman to lead off innings. The third was by right fielder Matt Miller, driving in Mike Campus with Post 104's only run of the game in the bottom of the third inning.

But that was about it for Gaithersburg (12-7-1), which has seen its bats go quiet in a four-game losing streak.

"Our problem is, the last couple of weeks we've stopped hitting," manager Joe Stolz said. "We were red-hot."

Post 104 threatened in the second inning, but ran itself into trouble. Silverman led off with a double, but was picked off second when Andrew Baltimore whiffed on a bunt attempt. Mike Murphy, who had walked in between, took second on the play, and reached third on a wild pitch.

Baltimore then walked and was picked off first, but instead of tagging him out, a heads-up Tommy Barksdale threw home to catch Murphy trying to sneak under the tag.

First baseman A.J. Bowman was the offensive star for Post 171, going 3 for 4 and taking a hand in all three runs. He singled and scored on a squeeze bunt in the fourth inning, then singled home Shane Boyd with the winning run in the fifth.

With two out and none on in the top of the seventh, he singled again, then scored the insurance run on an Andrew Osborne double.

Post 171 (7-10) has an uphill climb to reach the playoffs, which begin in a little over a week. But performances like Thursday's will help.

"We just have to play defense," Bowman said. "We've had a couple of errors and a couple of pitching mistakes. Ryan pitched great today, and the defense played well."