Junction City takes on McGehee at semi-finals.
JUNCTION CITY When Junction City and McGehee met in the semifinals of the 8-3A District Tournament last spring, the Dragons needed to overcome a 5-0 deficit to advance.
In their encounter on Friday, the Dragons quickly dashed any hopes the Owls had of pulling off an upset, as Jack Smith drove in five runs, belting a grand slam as part of a five-run first to lead Junction City to a 13-3
win over McGehee in the semifinals of the 8-3A District Tournament.
The win is the 11th straight for the top-seeded Dragons (23-7), who will face either Smackover or Fordyce for the district title this afternoon at 4:30 p.m.
McGehee (7-13) will be the No. 4 seed for next week’s regional tournament.
Brock McGoogan also hit a solo homer in the fourth for the
Dragons, who had 11 hits in the win.
Junction City also got a solid effort on the mound from Bryce Ware, who tossed a three-hitter to beat the Owls. He walked two, hit two batters and struck out six.
A junior, Ware retired the first eight batters of the game before hitting Jackson Snider with a pitch with two outs in the third.
“We talked about last year before we played McGehee,” said Junction City coach Joe Paul Hammett. “We just talked about being ready to play. Some of them hit the ball pretty well, and Jack got a big hit in the first inning when we scored five. That enabled us to relax a little bit at the plate, and Bryce threw a good ballgame.”
Ware led off the bottom of the first with a walk, but was erased from the basepaths when Clay Jolley bounced into a force play.
Keelan Hodge followed with a single and McGoogan walked to load the bases.
Charles Hoof then opened the scoring by lacing a base hit to center to bring home Jolley.
That set the stage for Smith, who crushed a 2-1 pitch over the fence
in left-center to give the Dragons a 5-0 lead.
McGoogan drove in a run in the second with an infield single that scored Ware, who walked, stole second, and took third on Hodge’s fielder’s choice.
The Dragons extended their lead with three runs in the third. Junction City loaded the bases with nobody out after Smith walked, Gabe Richard reached on an infield single and Ty Disotell got on due to catcher’s interference, but Smith was forced out at home on Tanner McLelland’s grounder to third.
Ware then helped his own cause by hitting a two-run double to left-center to give the Dragons an 8-0 lead.
Jolley followed with a sacrifice fly to score McLelland to push the lead to 9-0.
Despite facing a sizable deficit, the Owls fought back.
Ricky Morgan drilled a solo homer, the third of the game, to get the Owls on the board in the fourth.
The Dragons answered with two runs in the bottom of the fourth with McGoogan’s aforementioned solo blast to left that led off the inning, and an RBI single by Disotell that scored Richard, who reached on an infield single and took second on a wild pitch.
Down to their final out in the fifth, the Owls scored twice to extend the game on Carter Hawkins’ two-run double.
However, the Dragons ended the game via mercy rule in the bottom of the fifth with a literal walk-off win with Hoof and Smith drawing bases-loaded walks to end the game.
Hodge went 2-for-4, while McGoogan went 2-for-2 with a pair of walks.
After driving in four runs in Tuesday’s win at McCrory, Richard went 2-for-3.