By By Ryan Satcher/staff writer
March 24, 2002
It's just no telling which Northeast Lauderdale baseball team is going to show up.
The Trojans lost to Southeast 15-3 Saturday afternoon but bounced back to beat West Lauderdale in a thrilling 4-3, eight-inning, baseball game Saturday night.
Northeast scored a run in the bottom of the seventh and two runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to take a dramatic victory.
Trojans head coach Chris Harper was happy to see his team come through.
Matlock and West Lauderdale pitcher Jamie Fontain battled in a pitching duel for eight strong innings. Matlock allowed only three hits and struck out seven batters while Jamie Fontan struck out six batters and gave up only three hits in the first six innings before getting touched up in the seventh and eighth. The Knights got ahead in the first inning without getting the ball out of the infield. Ike Munn got an infield single and Trent Posey followed with a groundball. The Northeast defense made a fielding error and throwing error on the play to allow Munn to score and give West Lauderdale a 1-0 lead.
Northeast responded by scoring a run in the bottom of the first. Cory Chance doubled and later scored in the inning on a Knight error to make the score 1-1.
Both pitchers settled down for the next three innings. Finally in the fourth inning the Knights plated another run. Cody Powell walked and moved to second when a pitch got by the Northeast catcher. C.J. Fountain followed with a double to score Powell. Matlock was able to get out of the inning with no more damage.
The Knights kept their 2-1 advantage until the bottom of the seventh. Ryan Stewart got a two-out infield hit to get on base. Drew Anderson reached on another Trojan infield hit and the throw to first got by the first baseman. When the dust settled, the Trojans had a runner on second and third with two outs. J.R. Smith followed with a hard-hit hopper toward third. The ball took a tough hop and went into the outfield for an RBI single to tie the game up 2-2. Fontan got out of the inning with a groundball out and the game went into extra innings. Bo Davis started the top of the eighth with an infield hit. He stole second to get into scoring position and moved to third on a ground out by Munn.
The Trojans just missed a great opportunity when Posey missed a squeeze bunt and left Davis out to dry. The throw to third deflected off the runner and Davis made it back to third safely. Posey corrected his mistake by laying down a nice squeeze bunt to give the Knights a 3-2 advantage.
Northeast just wouldn't say die. Jonathan White singled with one out in the bottom of the eighth. Matlock helped his own cause as he followed with a hit to move White to third. Chad Brunson knocked in White with a single and Stewart got hit by a pitch to load the bases for Chance. Fontain ran out of steam and was unable to find the plate walking Chance to bring in the game-winning run and give Northeast a 4-3 victory. Northeast moves to 10-11 on the season. They will travel to play Southeast on Tuesday at 7 p.m.
Southeast 15
Northeast 3
The Trojans didn't look as impressive earlier in the day as the Tigers of Southeast banged out 10 hits and scored 15 runs to take the 15-3 in Saturday afternoon baseball.
Southeast scored six runs in the fifth inning and four runs in the seventh inning to pick up the victory.
The Tiger pitching gave up only one hit to the Northeast Trojans. Jay Butler led the Southeast scoring attack with a grand-slam homer. Tyler Overby had a double and single. Jason Pritchett had Northeast's only hit.
Phillip Butler picked up the victory for the Tigers.