For the Daily Journal
MORRISTOWN
A late-game Greenwood Christian rally came up just a run short in Class A baseball sectional semifinal action on Saturday afternoon.
No. 7 Southwestern scored four runs in the final two innings and held off the Cougars for a 4-3 win to advance to today’s championship, where it will play Mid-Hoosier Conference rival Waldron.
It was the end of the road for GCA (12-13), but the team played like it had all season, fighting and giving itself a chance to win at the end.
It was the third one-run loss for the Cougars, but as a young team — they only graduate three senior starters and five overall — they will learn from this and apply the lessons in the future.
Also of note was the Cougars gave the Spartans their closest game since Southwestern beat Triton Central 5-3 earlier this month. Since then, Southwestern (18-4) had pummeled their past seven opponents by an average of 10.5 runs.
“We tried to take the pressure off our young pups by telling them Southwestern was supposed to win and we are supposed to surprise everybody,” Greenwood Christian coach Doug Hagist said. “We gave it a shot. … They’re young, but scrappy. We played six great innings, and just a couple of mental mistakes cost us.”
In the first inning, GCA sophomore pitcher Trey Harney III endured two walks and a single, but got out of the inning thanks to the heads up play of third baseman Micah Vessely, who fielded a solidly hit ground ball by the Spartans’ Matt Clements and threw home to fellow freshman Colton Flint, who stepped on the plate for the force out. Harney then caught Christian DeArmitt looking at a third strike to get out of trouble.
Southwestern starter Clements also got out of a self-inflicted jam in the second inning after a pair of walks and single by senior Garrett Wright to load the bases. A strikeout and force at second base kept the Cougars from scoring.
It wasn’t until the sixth when Southwestern sent nine batters to the box and scored three times on a single, a pair of walks, a hit batsman and a throwing error. Hagist replaced Harney with Vessely, who stopped the bleeding.
The Spartans scored what turned out to be the winning run in the seventh when Anick Hartsell doubled and then scored when DeArmitt atoned for his bases-loaded whiff with a sharp single to right.
It appeared it was going to be a shutout for Clements and the Spartans with two outs, but Clements threw erratically to first on pinch-hitter Gabe Nelson’s tapper toward the mound that should have been the final out. Charlie Overton drew a walk, and with runners on first and second, senior Jake Simons stroked a single to score Nelson. Sophomore Jake Potter hit a two-run double to send the Cougars into a frenzy. Potter took third on a wild pitch and was within 90 feet of a tied contest, but Harney was thrown out on a hard grounder to short to end the game and season for Greenwood Christian.
Potter and Wright led the Cougars with two hits apiece.
“It was going to come down to youth,” Hagist said. “I don’t think they were physically better than us; I just think they were mentally tougher.”
