PREP BASEBALL: Tallassee sweeps Catholic in key Class 4A, Area 5 matchup
Catholic firstbaseman Ethan Levanda attempts to tag Tallassee’s Jack Butler in a game played on Wednesday at Catholic Field. (Tim Gayle)
By TIM GAYLE
Catholic coach Allen Ponder had been impressed with his team’s hitting ability and the Knights’ competitive spirit through the first 18 games of the season, but he didn’t see it on Tuesday and Wednesday.
“We had swung the bats well all season, up to this point,” Ponder said. “We preach hitting the ball low and hard and in the last two games, we hit a lot of balls hard and high.”
The Knights managed just three hits in Wednesday’s 4A Area 5 matchup with Tallassee, allowing the Tigers to complete the two-game sweep of the Knights with a 3-0 win on Wednesday after beating Catholic 5-1 in Tallassee on Tuesday.
The series was crucial between two of the three best teams in Area 5. Trinity was 2-0 entering Thursday’s area series with Booker T. Washington and Tallassee is 4-0 with series remaining next week against LAMP and the following week with Trinity. Catholic drops to 2-2 with a series with Trinity next week and LAMP the following week.
“It’s in our hands now,” Tallassee coach John Goodman said. “And that’s the way I want it to be. I’d rather it be in our hands and if we mess it up, then we mess it up. But I don’t want to have to rely on somebody to beat somebody.”
The Tigers (12-9) picked up six wins over the last week in games with Booker T. Washington, Percy Julian and Bullock County, so this week’s series with Catholic (14-6) was expected to provide a stiff challenge. Instead, the Tigers continued their momentum building stretch with a hard-hitting offense, an error-free defense and an aggressive style of play unmatched by the Knights.
“You really expect your guys to find ways to come out and compete and we just didn’t find ways to get it done in the last two games,” Ponder said. “But all the credit to Tallassee. Tallassee came in hungry, ready to win and with a belief that they could win. And they did the things they needed to do to win. They found barrels (at the plate), they threw strikes consistently and made us earn everything.
“They did things that we’ve been really good at the entire season but didn’t do well the last two games. It’s really disappointing that we picked two of the most important games of the season to not get those things done.”
Avery Brantley threw the first five innings for Tallassee, allowing just a single by Will Vucovich in the second inning and a double by Fred Lewis in the fourth while striking out five and walking two.
Hamp Love pitched the final two innings, allowing just a leadoff single by Will Blackwell in the seventh.
“They attacked us,” Ponder said. “They attacked fastballs with the barrel, they hit balls hard on the ground and they threw strikes. They threw the fastball for a strike and made us earn everything. We just didn’t do a good job of earning anything the last two games. When we threw fastballs, they found barrels and got base hits. When they threw fastballs, we were finding barrels but we were hitting pop flys. We’re easy outs.
“The things that we had done really well to get to this point, we just didn’t do them well.”
Tallassee, meanwhile, got an RBI single by Abram Whittington in the fourth and added two more runs in the top of the seventh on a bases-loaded, two-strike bunt by Jack Butler and a run from Love after Braylon Rigsby was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. Still, Goodman pointed at the other scoring opportunities after the Tigers had at least two base runners in each of the first four innings but managed just one run.
“We missed two bunts with runners on first and second and no outs, a chance to blow it open in the fourth,” he said. “Then we had bases loaded in the first and didn’t score, bases loaded in the seventh and got a couple of runs but left the bases loaded. That is our Achilles’ heel right now. We just can’t find the right rhythm. But it’s getting better.”
On Wednesday, it was more than enough.