GNTC awards four students with The Governor Nathan Deal Technical Education Scholarship
Ramblers fall to Cross Creek in Elite Eight
Four Georgia Northwestern Technical College (GNTC) students received The Governor Nathan Deal Technical Education Scholarship, an award of up to $2,500 for academic achievement for students enrolled in an industrial program at the Whitfield Murray Campus (WMC).
The four students are Ashley Vineyard, Logistics and Supply Chain Management; Jose Cruz, Computer Numerical Control (CNC) Technology; Matthew Dunn, Automation Engineering Technology and Stephen Hensley, Automation Engineering Technology. Each received a
$500 scholarship. Cruz is the only student who has received the award twice, having received it in 2020.
The Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI) established the scholarship in 2018 in partnership with the Community Foundation of Northwest Georgia. According to President and CEO of CRI and Technical College System of Georgia (TCSG) Board Member Joe Yarbrough, the scholarship honors former Governor
Nathan Deal for his dedication to technical education in Georgia.
“I am most proud of the great relationship enjoyed by the member companies of the Carpet and Rug Institute and the entire Whitfield Murray region,” Yarbrough said. “The students attaining the skills needed for our workforce have great career opportunities here. The desire to provide scholarship support to high-achieving students through the Governor Nathan Deal Scholarship established by the CRI is truly a privilege.”
According to David Aft, Community Foundation of Northwest Georgia president, this is the scholarship’s second term since its establishment in 2018. Aft said the scholarship was a fitting tribute to the former governor who worked so closely with the northwest Georgia region.
“We are proud to work with the Carpet and Rug Institute and with Georgia Northwestern Technical College,” said Aft. “Their goals parallel our own, a prepared workforce and all of the opportunities fulltime employment presents to our friends and neighbors.”
The scholarship was set up as an endowment, which gains interest over time and will fund future awards, Aft added. WMC students majoring in Applied Technical Management, Automation Engineering Technology, Chemical Technology, CNC Technology, Diesel Equipment Technology, Flooring Production, Industrial Systems Technology, Precision Machining and Manufacturing as well as Welding and Joining Technology programs are eligible for the scholarship.
CRI is the leading industry source for sciencebased information and insight on how carpet and rugs create a better environment for living, working, learning and healing. CRI’s mission is to serve the carpet industry and public by providing facts that help people make informed choices. Its best practices promote a balance between social, economic and environmental responsibility for the long term. CRI does this for its industry, yet it strives to be a model corporate citizen for all industries.
The Community Foundation of Northwest Georgia works with individuals and families to help them get the most out of their charitable giving. The foundation strengthens communities by fostering collaboration and awarding grants to qualified organizations to help them address needs throughout the region. They also help organizations build endowments to secure their futures.
There’s one thing for certain when a team makes it to the Elite Eight round in the state playoffs, there will be no more easy games, nor will there be any teams that aren’t high caliber.
The LaFayette Ramblers are one of those teams and proved again last Wednesday night that they deserve to be mentioned among the elite programs in all of Class 3A. However, the same can be said of Cross Creek.
The Razorbacks, last year’s Class AAAA state runner-up, made the long drive up from Augusta on Wednesday and ended the Ramblers’ season for the second year in a row with a 72-60 victory in the Class AAA state quarterfinals.
I’m just proud of these boys,” said LaFayette head coach Hank Peppers afterward. “You see them coming out of the locker room and none of them had a dry eye because they all care about it so much. To be honest, there wasn’t a dry eye with the coaches either because we’ve all invested so much into it.
“I just wanted it for the kids. I wanted to see them celebrate and be happy and that’s really where my whole motivation comes from...that’s my passion. I want to give them an experience that will last a lifetime.”
Cross Creek led by nine points on two different occasions in the first quarter, thanks to back-to-back 3-pointers by guard Richard Visitacion. LaFayette, however, continued to hang around and never let the Razorbacks get too far away as they pulled back to within four points at the
end of the first quarter.
The Ramblers would get back to within three points of lead, 22-19, on a 3-pointer by Zach Barrett with 3:36 remaining in the half. However, the visitors immediately answered with a 3-pointer and a 3-point play on their next two trips down the court and, despite committing 13 fouls in the first half, took a 30-23 lead into the locker room.
LaFayette again tried to cut into the lead in the third quarter as a drive to the basket by Jaylon Ramsey brought them to within four points, 33-29, with 5:23 left in the period. But the Razorbacks would quickly reel off a 9-0 run in less than 90 seconds to take to their biggest lead of the night, 42-29, with 3:50 left in the quarter.
LaFayette refused to roll over and had a chance get the deficit back down to single digits in the closing seconds. However, a turnover was converted into a Razorback basket at the opposite end of the court and the visitors would take a 51-39 lead into the fourth quarter.
The two teams exchanged baskets to begin the final period when LaFayette began its long-awaited charge.
An Aidan Hadaway basket in the paint cut Cross Creek’s lead down to eight, Then, after a block by Hadaway, the junior ran the floor and was rewarded with what became of 3-point play with 3:54 remaining. After stopping the Razorbacks at the other end, Junior Barber made a strong drive to the hoop, connecting on the way up and drawing the fifth foul on guard Devin Pope. Barber would sink the free throw and the Ramblers were suddenly down by a just single basket at 57-55 with just over three minutes to play.
But with Dan Priest Gymnasium absolutely roaring and LaFayette appearing to have all the momentum, Cross Creek’s Joshua Dorsey launched a 3-pointer from the corner — his only long-range attempt of the night — and drew a foul as the ball found nothing but the bottom of the net, which quieted the crowd. Dorsey would make the bonus foul shot to up the lead back to six and LaFayette would never get any closer.
Visitacion knifed through the lane before dishing to center Corey Trotter for an easy finish at the rim with 1:47 to go and the Rambler were forced to start fouling soon thereafter. Vistiacion, who finished the night with a game-high 27 points, hit 6 of 6 free throws down the stretch to seal a return trip to the state semifinals for his team.
Pope finished with 22 points for the fifth-ranked Razorbacks, while Trotter picked up 11.
“I was very proud of the guys for battling back,” Peppers said. “We shot a very poor percentage, though their defense had something to do with that. It didn’t bounce our way tonight, but Cross Creek has a heck of a team. There’s a reason they’re in the final eight. They’re long, they’re big, they can shoot and they got one of the best guards I’ve ever seen in high school.”
Hadaway racked up 25 points for sixth-ranked LaFayette (222), followed by Barber with 16 and Ramsey with eight. Barrett added six points on a pair of threes and senior DeCameron Porter finished with five points and several blocked shots throughout the night in what turned out to be his final game as a Rambler.
“Cam is one of the best players to ever play here,” Peppers stated. “You look at his four-year career. We went 253, 24-3, 25-3 and 22-2, won three region titles and made three Elite Eight appearances. Not many people are going to compete with that resume and he’s had a major hand in all of that. We’re proud to have had him here. I love him and he’s been just a big piece of our program.
“Like a lot of our former players, I’m sure we’ll see him around a lot and it’ll be like he’s still a part of this, because he always will be.”
While replacing everything Porter brought to the table will be extremely difficult, Peppers said he is looking forward to trying to continue the Ramblers’ run next season with four of five starters and all his bench players returning.
“What we’re bringing back could be scary good,” he added. “We’ll have a team that can really run and gun. A lot of different guys can score, but the main thing is that everybody can defend. They can defend, they can rebound and they play hard and when you do that, good things will happen. I’m very excited with what we have coming back.”
Cross Creek — Windsor Forest score goes here
Top-ranked Sandy Creek crushed No. 2-ranked Hart County in the other semifinal, 87-56.
The Saddle Ridge Mustangs earned a 138-148 win in a five-hole match at the LaFayette Golf Course on Thursday.
Saddle Ridge’s Hayden Bowman was the day’s low medalist with a 31, which included a 30-foot birdie putt on his final hole of the day. It was Bowman’s first career birdie.
Also teeing it up for the Mustangs was Taylor Clarke (34), Shane Johnson (36) and Wyatt Eldridge (37).
Emma Veach, Ian Medford and Zach Hawkins and Trevor Dickerson all carded a 37 for the Eagles.
Get ready for another season — hopefully, the last — of the most hapless act in sports.
Pitchers trying to pass themselves off as hitters.
Pity those like Atlanta phenom Ian Anderson, who’s not exactly looking forward to stepping into the batter’s box for the first time since the 2019 Double-A season, when he went 0 for 15 with 11 strikeouts.
“I think my first at-bat was my hardest hit and it kind of went downhill from that,” Anderson recalled. ”I haven’t hit in quite some time. So don’t expect too much.”
It didn’t have to be this way. Major League Baseball and the players union could have come to a reasonable compromise that allowed the designated hitter in both leagues, as they did during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
But, of course, the two sides managed to botch the talks. Now, the DH isn’t expected to come up again until next winter, when it will be part of the knock-down, drag-out brawl over a new labor agreement.
For National League pitchers, that means it’s back to the batting cage to work on their feeble swings.
“Hitting a round ball with a round bat is already hard enough,” said NL MVP Freddie Freeman. “To give guys a whole year and a half off from doing that — and they’re not good hitters anyway — is going to make it even worse.”
His advice?
“Just try to hit the ball,” he said, chuckling, “and if there’s a guy on first, bunt him over. That’s all I’ve got.”
There’s still a slight chance to avoid this farce before opening day, but MLB has no plans to make another offer to the union, so it looks as though the DH will be used only in the American League this season.
Leave it to baseball to go back to a dual, unnecessary system that is totally out of touch with the times and only favored by the handful of pitchers who have some idea what they’re doing with a bat in their hands.
“Guys don’t grow up hitting like they used to,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said Friday. “Pitchers used to be better hitters because they grew up hitting. Nowadays, pitchers don’t even pick up a bat when they’re growing up.”
A season without the DH is just what baseball doesn’t need as it tries to modernize and lure a younger fan base to the game.
“We’ve got to continue to be progressive in MLB,” Miami Marlins manager Don Mattingly said. “We’ve got to continue to put a product out there that people want to see, that has action, and continues to hold our attention.”
That’s increasingly important in today’s increasingly fragmented world, where so many sports fans have turned away from the national pastime.
“In the NFL and NBA, you watch the rules change,” Mattingly says. “You don’t want to change the core of the game. But we have to be open-minded to change to make this a product people want to see.”
Full disclosure: I was long opposed to the DH, or at the very least, comfortable with the idea of having different rules for the two leagues. But watching even a shortened season with the universal DH easily persuaded me that the game is much better off with nine legitimate hitters in the order.
Freeman followed a similar path to DH enlightenment — especially after seeing all the run-producing opportunities he was afforded batting second in a Braves lineup that was stacked from top to bottom.
He finished with 53 RBIs in 60 games.
“I was always that National League guy who thought there’s so many different strategies you can do with the pitcher hitting,” Freeman said. “But every single time I came up last season, it seemed like there were guys on first and second. There are so many more RBI opportunities when you have a real hitter down there in the nine hole.”
Oakland A’s third baseman Matt Chapman scoffed at the NL version of the game. He noted that everyone on his AL team benefits from the lineup versatility the DH provides.
“Pitchers don’t really need to hit anymore, they just need to focus on pitching,” he said. “It’s nice to have a DH on both sides because it gives guys days off and they can DH instead of take a full day off.”
Besides, baseball’s pipeline has changed so much that it’s no longer reasonable to require pitchers to take a turn at bat.
The DH is used almost exclusively throughout the minors, giving pitchers few chances to hit on their way to the big leagues. Teams certainly don’t want their prized arms to be risking injury by taking a swing, or getting hit by a pitch, or even the rare possibility of being forced to run the bases.
While pitchers have always been viewed as the weakest link in the batting order, there was a time when they weren’t automatic outs.
Hall of Famer Bob Gibson was renowned for his hitting skills, totaling 24 homers over his career and finishing with a respectable batting average of .206 — including a careerbest .303 in 124 plate appearances during the 1970 season. He famously homered in his Game 7 victory over the Red Sox in the 1967 World Series.
There are still a few pitchers who enjoy stepping into the batter’s box.
“I always considered myself a pretty good hitter,” San Diego starter Joe Musgrove said. “I don’t see myself as just a pitcher. We get to play once every five days, so when I’m on the field I’m trying to do as much as I can to help the team win.”
By a pitcher’s standards, Musgrove is indeed a decent hitter.
But his career average is still a puny .149, with as many sacrifice bunts as hits (13 apiece) in 102 plate appearances. He’s yet to hit a homer, and has just three RBIs.
Baseball gets little value out of requiring Musgrove — or any other pitcher — to step into the box.
Back in 1973, with attendance dwindling and offenses struggling, the AL first instituted the DH to widespread ridicule from those who felt it made a mockery of the game.
The NL has long resisted, but it now seems inevitable that it will follow the junior circuit’s lead.
Not soon enough, however. Which means if you’re able to attend a game at an NL ballpark this season, be prepared for a stiff summer breeze.
The pitchers will be swinging away.
Just don’t expect them to hit anything.