American Legion
Aggressive base running and timely hits carried Russellville as it pulled away to beat El Dorado 9-4 in the winner’s bracket final Monday at the University of Central Arkansas.
CONWAY — Russellville used a familiar formula to wiggle its way back to the AAA American Legion state title game.
Aggressive base running and timely hits carried the Pirates as they pulled away to beat El Dorado 9-4 in the winner’s bracket final on a scorching Monday afternoon at the University of Central Arkansas’ Bear Stadium.
Luke Ray and Lance Millsaps knocked in two runs apiece for Russellville, which used a 13-hit attack to clinch a berth in the championship game for the second year in a row. The Pirates lost to Fort Smith 4-2 in last season’s final but will get two cracks at this year’s crown.
The Pirates are the only undefeated team left in the tournament and can capture the title today at 6 p.m. against the winner of El Dorado and Cabot. In the late game Monday, Cabot beat Fort Smith 138. The RailCats, who beat Paragould 18-8 earlier in the day behind a three-run home run from Jaiden Ryals, will face El Dorado at 3 p.m. in the loser’s bracket final.
If Russellville loses tonight, there will be a deciding game Wednesday at 3 p.m.
Pirates Coach David Dawson hopes his team can avoid that winner-take-all scenario by taking care of business on the first try.
“Whoever we play will be tough,” Dawson said before knowing that Cabot advanced. “We know we’ve got to throw strikes on the mound and can’t make many mistakes on defense. Not striking out is a big thing with us, too. So we’ve got to be able to come up with some hits and put pressure on the defense. But we know it’s going to be tough.”
The Pirates made it tough on a red-hot El Dorado Oilers team on a day when temperatures hovered near 100 degrees.
Russellville had nine steals, four of which came in a fiverun first inning. The Pirates executed two double-steals of home plate— one in the first and another in the seventh — that resulted in scores. That assertive nature is what Russellville has hung its hat on all season.
“We don’t have a lot of power, so we always want to put the ball in play,” Dawson said. “And then once we do that, we’re going to be very aggressive … that’s it. We’re a very scrappy bunch, and we’ve got a lot of speed. So we want to try to put pressure on the other team’s defense as much as we can.”
The Pirates did that from the outset against the Oilers, who had won their previous eight games. Russellville managed to work deep into pitch counts as well, which oftentimes resulted in sharply hit singles that allowed the Pirates to effectively work maneuver around the base paths.
Eight different players registered hits for Russellville, with Tate Jones leading the way with three. Ray, Millsaps and Kaleb Tramel each finished with two hits.
Jake Eubanks and Hunter Lawrence had two hits each for El Dorado, which kept the game fairly close despite falling into an early 5-0 deficit.
Both Ray and Millsaps recorded their RBI in the opening inning, with Ray eventually scoring on the first of Russellville’s double-steal attempts.
The Oilers pushed across two runs in the bottom half of the inning on a double from Ashton Yarbrough, and later pulled within 6-3 in the fifth on Lawrence’s run-scoring single.
Russellville tacked on three runs in the seventh, highlighted by Brandon Bunton’s score on another double steal, to put El Dorado into a deeper hole.
“That big first inning was huge,” Dawson said. “We took advantage of a couple of guys being hit by pitches, then got a couple of big hits. But then Ty [Hipps], I thought, pitched very well for us, too.
“El Dorado is a very, very good offensive team, and we were able to get out of some jams by turning a couple of double plays on some hard line drives that could’ve completely changed the game.”
Hipps allowed 6 hits and struck out 3 in 5 innings. Tramel closed things out after coming on in relief in the top of the sixth.