Princeton – Momentum in baseball is more fickle than perhaps in any other sport.
A big inning can be met with a deflating answer that leaves no end in sight.
Beckley’s baseball team experienced that in painful fashion Wednesday.
Trailing 4-1 entering the fifth inning, the Flying Eagles scored five runs in the top of the frame to take the lead, only to yield five in the bottom of the inning, falling 9-6 to Shady Spring in the quarterfinals of the Coppinger Tournament Wednesday at Hunnicutt Field in Princeton.
It finally looked like the Flying Eagles had found a solution at the plate after standing four runners in the first three innings – three of them in scoring position.
“The thing about it is a little later on in the game we did better,” Beckley head coach J.P. Stevens said. “They made an adjustment. It is what it is but Shady’s a good baseball team and they’re going to find outs.”
Early the Tigers provided the opposite of their Raleigh County foes, driving in runs in the first two innings to take a 4-1 lead. The offense came mostly on the strength of hitting hoppers up the middle, working the count and running the bases well.
After Josh Lovell grounded out for the second out of the first frame, Evan Belcher was hit by a pitch to put two on for Tyler Mackey. The speedy playmaker delivered, hitting a single that scored Alex Johnston and Belcher, taking second on a bobbled ball in center. Aden Seabolt followed with his own single to plate Mackey before Beckley pitcher Reid Warden picked Seabolt off second for the final out.
Shady kept the offense rolling in the second with Johnston driving in Adam Richmond on a bases-loaded sac fly but Beckley’s newest pitcher, Danny Dickenson, escaped further damage with a flyout. Dickenson helped his own cause in the third with an RBI single that plated Ty Evans but the scoring stalled until the fifth.
That was when a leadoff single from Evans ignited the rally as the first six Flying Eagles of the inning reached base with Blake Stratton’s two-run single giving Beckley a 5-4 advantage. Micah Clay followed with a single that plated Stratton but after the first three batters reached base Shady coach Jordan Meadows elected to pull Belcher, his starter, and give Tyler Reed a shot.
“One thing about us is we go hard,” Stevens said. “It doesn’t matter if we’re down 13 or 14 runs, we’re not going to quit. If we can get them to play with that kind of attitude the whole time we’ll be alright. They did give good effort and hit the ball.”
Reed struggled from the start, allowing two earned runs but settled down after Clay’s hit to retire the next three in a row and escape further damage.
“Before the game we knew we didn’t have David (Young), Cam (Manns) or Alex (Johnston) but we told Evan four or five innings and he stepped up as a senior,” Meadows said. “He got a little tired at the end but we put in Reed and he minimized the damage and we matched it with five runs.”
After leading off the bottom of the frame with a groundout, Shady’s next eight batters reached base with the rally ignited by Mackey and Richmond.
Mackey smacked a one-out triple off the fence in left and scored on a Seabolt single. Richmond followed with his own moonshot triple, tying the game at six before an error kept the one-out surge alive, allowing Richmond to score. A single from Reed and a walk to Jacob Meadows kept the nightmare rolling.
After an RBI single from Johnston and a bases-loaded walk to Lovell plated two more, the Flying Eagles finally stopped the bleeding with a pop out and a flyout.
Aside from a one-out double off the bat of Connor Mollohan, Beckley never threatened again, stranding six runners total on the evening – all of them in scoring position. It was a frustrating outcome for a team that only struck out four times, but played into Shady’s strategy.
“Evan stepped up last year in a position where we had some injuries and ever since then he does the things we need,” Meadows said. “He’s a great team player and on the mound we told him to throw strikes, let them hit it and we’ll score more runs than they do and he did a great job and I can’t thank him enough.”
Shady advances to the Coppinger semifinals where it will play Marion, Va. on Thursday at Bowen Field in Bluefield.
