Greenwood’s Micah Vessely delivers a pitch during Friday’s game against Whiteland.
Rob Baker | For the Daily Journal
Greenwood had to sit around for three extra days before playing its first Johnson County tournament game, and then needed to go into an extra inning to get the thing settled.
Worth it.
Junior Ethan King delivered a walk-off RBI single in the bottom of the eighth to lift the Woodmen — who had let an early four-run cushion slip away — to a 6-5 triumph over Whiteland on Friday night.
The Woodmen (2-2, 1-0 Mid-State) will face another conference rival today when they take on Franklin in a semifinal battle at Center Grove.
Mavrick Pauley led off the decisive frame with a walk for the Woodmen and then moved to second on a Cade Kelly sacrifice bunt. King then worked the county full against Whiteland reliever Peyton Dickens and got the pitch he was looking for, taking it up the middle and allowing Pauley to trot across with the winning run.
“(Dickens) throws a lot of fastballs, and he had just thrown me two curveballs in a row,” King said, “so I knew I had to jump on that. I knew, full count, it was going to be a fastball.”
The hit ended a wild game that featured multiple big momentum swings, the last of which started when the Woodmen tied it back up in the bottom of the seventh.
“We talk all the time about get a guy on, get him over, get him in,” Greenwood coach Andy Bass said, “and we did it two innings in a row … to tie it and then to win it. I was just super proud of them.”
After Greenwood starter Micah Vessely wiggled out of a jam in the top of the first, getting a pair of outs on the bases, his teammates got him a lead in the bottom of the inning. King, who had three hits on the evening, reached on a one-out single and then came all the way around to score on a double to left center field by Jagger Bray.
In the third, Warriors hurler Drew Helton got himself into trouble by hitting the first two batters he faced, and an error loaded the bases with nobody out. The senior struck out the next two to inch close to an escape, but Eli Mason came through with an RBI base hit and Brendan Bailey followed with a two-run single to stretch the Woodmen lead to 4-0.
Helton got one of the runs back himself in the top of the fourth when he reached on an infield hit, took second on a passed ball and scored on a Jordan Palmer single. Blake Riddle and Brody Williams then followed with consecutive RBI doubles to bring Whiteland within a run before Vessely retired the next three hitters to end the inning with two runners on.
The Warriors (1-1, 0-1) got another rally started in the fifth with a hit batter and a pair of Greenwood errors, one of which allowed Helton to score the tying run. Williams’ second double in as many innings brought Palmer in to put the Warriors up 5-4.
Helton held that lead through the sixth inning, working around baserunners in each inning after the third, before the Woodmen were able to chase him from the game in the bottom of the seventh with base hits from Mason and Bailey that put runners at the corners with one out. Pinch hitter Kyle Mitchell’s RBI groundout against Dickens plated Mason with the tying run.
King’s heroics made a winner of senior Logan Connor, who came on and pitched three scoreless innings in relief of Vessely. He retired the last seven Whiteland hitters he faced.
“Logan came in and did what Logan did all last year, and that’s just shut the door on people,” Bass said.
Bailey added two hits for Greenwood. Riddle and Williams each had a pair of two-baggers for the Warriors.
Having vanquished the Warriors, the Woodmen won’t have Vessely or Connor available to pitch in the semifinal against the Grizzly Cubs — but that’s an issue Bass is happy to have at this point.
“It makes it difficult,” Bass said, “but it beats the alternative.”
