RAMSEY
Dramatic is one way to describe the two meetings between Brownstown Central and Scottsburg’s baseball teams this spring.
Brownstown pulled out a wild 16-15 Mid-Southern Conference win on the road April 26.
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Then in Wednesday’s Class 3A Sectional 30 opener Wednesday night at North Harrison, the Braves fell behind 7-1, inched back in the game late and took the lead for the first time in the top of the seventh inning for an 11-7 advantage.
The Warriors tacked on a couple runs in the bottom of the seventh, but that was it, and the Braves breathed a sigh of relief with an 11-9 win.
“I was proud of the way our team came back and fought,” Braves coach Brandon Tormoehlen said after the two-and-a-half-hour battle. “They literally played 21 outs. It took us to 21 outs to get the lead, and I was happy to see that. I was happy to see that they didn’t give in and they had some fight to them.”
Through the first three innings, Scottsburg put together eight hits and seven runs to build a 7-1 lead.
Isaac Horton took over on the mound for the Braves in the bottom of the third inning with two outs and the bases load and ended the threat with a strikeout.
The junior right-hander then only gave up two hits and struck out five more batters in holding the Warriors scoreless.
In the top of the fifth inning, the Braves’ Isaiah Wineinger led off with a double to deep left-center field, and Seth Borden followed with his second hit of the game.
With one out and Matthew Garland at the plate, Wineinger scored on a wild pitch before Garland got a bunt single. Then with Matthew Bell at the plate, Borden and Garland scored on two different wild pitches and a Warriors error, making it a 7-4 game.
With one out in the top of the sixth, Wineinger singled to left field, and he and Clayton Barger advanced a base on a fielding error. Lucas Hines was hit by a pitch with two outs, loading the bases for Garland.
His ensuing hit into shallow left field scored Barger to pull the Braves within 7-5.
Then came the dramatic seventh inning.
Horton hit a one-out single. Then with two outs, Clay Chastain hit his third single of the night, and Wineinger followed with a two-RBI hit to deep left field to even the game at 7.
Scottsburg intentionally walked Borden, and Hines came up in the clutch with his first hit of the game, a two-RBI triple.
Garland and Bell then hit back-to-back triples. Garland’s brought in Hines, and Garland ran home on a Scottsburg throwing error.
The Warriors scored twice on two hits and an error in the bottom of the seventh, but Wineinger caught Scottsburg’s Andrew Banet looking at a full-count pitch to end the game.
Chastain, Wineinger and Garland each recorded three hits for the Braves (20-7), while Borden had a triple and a single. Garland led with three RBI, and Wineinger and Hines both had two.
Four Braves pitchers combined to allow 12 hits and eight walks and strike out 11. Horton had seven of the strikeouts in his 3.1 innings of work.
“We didn’t come out ready to play at all. We weren’t working ahead,” Tormoehlen said. “We left balls up. We were putting them in hitter’s counts, and Scottsburg came out and did a nice job swinging the bat. At one point, they had seven runs on eight hits. That just goes to show we were walking too many people. Hopefully, we can get that cleaned up for Friday.”
At 5:30 p.m. that day, the Braves will take on the winner of the Silver Creek-Salem game, which followed Wednesday’s opener.
