HoCo used a strong first inning to set the tone early & defeat county rival Veterans at the Warhawks’ Diamond earlier this evening 8-2. The Bears got on the board by way of a Kai Decker two rbi double to lead 2-0 & senior Elijah Smith had an rbi single that ran in Decker to push the HoCo lead to 3-0 after 1/2 an inning of play.
The Warhawks got on the board via a HoCo error to trail 3-1 after one inning of play. HoCo extended it’s lead to 4-1 in the top half of the third via a Veterans error. Kai Decker would hit another two rbi double to push the lead to 6-1 in favor of the visitors in the top half of the fifth inning. Veterans would cut the gap down to 6-2 via a T. O’Neal rbi single that ran in J. Beach in the bottom half of the fifth.
Senior Drew Burress ran in a run with an rbi single with an advance to 2nd but was tagged out in the process & brought the HoCo lead back to five 7-2 after 5 1/2 innings of play. The Bears added in one more run in the top half of the seventh when Elijah Smith hit a sac fly to left that ran in Kai Decker to bring the lead to 8-2 HoCo & the Bears finished the game off to win 8-2.
Senior Ryker Chavis pitched a gem for HoCo by striking out eleven, allowing one earned run, & walking one in five innings of work. Kai Decker led the Bears in scoring with four rbis followed by Elijah Smith with two, & Drew Burress with one. Noah Fries was on the mound for Veterans tonight & pitched a complete game & allowed 10 hits, 5 earned runs, struck out one, & walked one. T. O’Neal had the Warhawks’ only rbi of the night.
HoCo had 10 hits & committed 2 errors while Veterans had 7 hits & committed 5 errors. The Bears improved to 13-1 overall; 4-0 in region play while the Warhawks fell to 8-7 overall; 0-4 in region play.
Elsewhere; the Northside Eagles traveled to take on the Lee Co Trojans that resulted in a Trojans shutout victory 7-0. Lee Co scored three runs in the second, two in the fifth, & two in the sixth. The Trojans had 9 hits & committed 1 error while the Eagles had 4 hits & committed 1 error.
Gavin Smith pitched a gem for Lee Co by striking out eleven, allowed no runs & no walks in six innings of work while Conner Beck was the starting pitcher for Northside & allowed three earned runs, walked three, & struck out two in two innings of work. Lee Co improved to 11-4 overall; 2-2 in region play while Northside fell to 2-11 overall; 0-4 in region play.
Last Friday; it turns out the Veterans Warhawks did indeed play @ Thomas Co Central in a doubleheader that resulted in a Yellow Jackets sweep 9-5 & 5-1. Game one was tied at 5 going into the bottom half of the sixth where TCC got all four of their runs back after squandering a four run lead in the top half of the sixth & would go on to win game one 9-5.
Veterans struck first in game two to lead 1-0 but Thomas Co Central scored the last five runs of the game in innings three, four, & five to take game two 5-1 over the Warhawks. The Yellow Jackets currently sit at 10-5 overall; 3-1 in region play after falling to Tift Co at home earlier this evening 4-3.
