Sonoraville Phoenix gets ready for final 7-4A series
MTenney@CalhounTimes.com
The Region 7-4A baseball championship will be on the line this week when Sonoraville faces Cedartown in the final three-game regular season series for both teams.
The Phoenix, by sweeping Heritage last week in a three-game set to secure at least the second seed in the league and a first-round home playoff series, trail the Bulldogs by two games, meaning they pretty much need a sweep of a team that has yet to lose in Region play to get that crown and top seed.
But the big thing is they still have a chance to win the Region. And in their first year as a 4A program, they are definitely headed back to the playoffs.
“It’s going to be a very big series,” Sonoraville High head baseball coach Deron Walraven said. “Cedartown’s coming off a Final Four appearance and they’re a seniordominant team like we are. They’re unbeaten in the Region, but they have had some close games. But they’ve also had some blowouts. So we need to go out and just play like we have been playing. Just take it one pitch at a time, whether we’re at the plate or in the field, and go out and play our best baseball. But we’re looking forward to it. I think we’re feeling pretty good after this series against Heritage and now we’ve still got a chance to win a Region championship, so we’re going to go for it.”
The Phoenix stayed two games behind the league-leading Bulldogs by winning the final two games of their three-game set with Heritage Wednesday night at the packed Furnace in a crucial doubleheader that had a playoff atmosphere to it for both teams.
Behind excellent pitching from starter A.J. Hensley and then junior Jaxon Pate in relief, Sonoraville scored three runs in the bottom of the fifth to rally for a 3-1 win in the first game. Then in the nightcap, the Phoenix pushed across a run in the bottom of the seventh
BASEBALL,
inning to take a thrilling 6-5 victory over the Generals that put them four full games ahead of Heritage.
The two hard-scrabble wins means they are now 10-2 in their first year in Region 7-4A and looking for a championship when they take the field in Game One against Cedartown 5 p.m. Monday night at The Furnace. The teams then complete the series and the regular season schedule with a doubleheader starting 5 p.m. Wednesday at Cedartown.
“We’re going in with the intentions of trying to win three games just like I am sure they are,” Walraven said. “But we expect a good series. I mean there’s even a chance we could win two out of three against them, which would mean we would have won the series against every other team in the Region, and still not win the region. So how crazy is that? But I think it speaks to just how strong our Region is.”
Cedartown will head into that last series with a 12-0 mark in the Region after they took three easy wins over last-place Southeast Whitfield County this week.
For Sonoraville, they simply made the big pitch or got the big hit when they needed it Wednesday
afternoon/evening against a Heritage team that entered the series with 16 wins just like the Phoenix.
Heritage drew first blood in that initial game with an unearned run in the first inning, but from there first Hensley and then Pate keep them off the board.
In fact, after that first at-bat, the Generals didn’t have many baserunners period.
The Phoenix scored all three of their runs in the bottom of the fifth and with their pitching, it would be enough to give them the win.
With one out, senior lead-off hitter Zach Lyles started the decisive outburst with a bouncing base hit to left field. He moved up to second base when the Heritage catcher dropped a pitch and Pate followed him with an RBI single to right field, tying the game at one.
Senior Kannon England then belted the hosts’ third straight single, giving the team runners on the corners.
Senior Devyn Ferguson followed with an infield single that got past the Heritage pitcher and allowed Pate to score the goahead run. Also by the time the Generals’ infielder reached the ball, Ferguson was able to beat it out at first base and give the Phoenix two runners on base.
After an infield pop-up resulted in the second out, Dawson
Townsend hit a line shot to third that the Generals couldn’t field cleanly and England raced to the plate for a 3-1 lead that would hold up.
Heritage would make one final threat in the top of the sixth when the Generals, thanks to a single and an error, got two men on with just one out. But Pate got a ground ball to second and the Phoenix turned it into a 4-63 double play to end the inning and keep the lead.
In the top of the seventh, Pate set Heritage down in order.
In a season full of late-inning magic for the Phoenix, the Big Red got some more to win Game Two, scoring a run in the bottom of the seventh inning for their fifth walk-off win this year.
“We’ve been in these close lategame situations a few times now and the kids just keep fighting,” Walraven said. “And that’s what it takes to get it done in those situations. You’ve got to be confident and believe you can get it done and the kids have done that. But it really was a great way to end what turned out to be a long, hard night of baseball.”
Sonoraville scored first in the night, plating two runs in the bottom of the first inning for England, who was the starting pitching in Game Two.
The hosts notched another run in the bottom of the fourth inning for a 3-0 bulge before the visitors began a comeback that would see them tie the game at five going into the bottom of the seventh.
The Generals’ got on the board with one run in the top of the fifth and closed it to a one-run deficit with another solo score in the sixth, making it 3-2.
The Phoenix looked like they might have put it away with two runs in the bottom of the sixth, putting them in front, 5-2, but the Generals scored three times in the top of the seventh to tie things up.
And also set up more of this season’s late-game heroics.
Senior Jackson Balliew was hit by a pitch with nobody out to give the Phoenix a baserunner to start the home half of the seventh. A wild pitch moved him to second and Easton Childs bunted him to third base.
After a pop-up for the second out, Pate, who got the save in Game One and the pitching win in Game Two, then rifled a shot into left field to bring in Balliew and start the late-night celebration.
Pate would finish that second game 3-for-4 at the plate while England and Lyles were both 2-for-3.
The victories lifted Sonoraville to 18-6 on the year overall. Heritage fell to 16-9 on the spring.