District 1AA Baseball Tournament: Unicoi tops Happy Valley in nail-biter

Published 11:05 pm Monday, May 9, 2016

The Warriors’ wild postseason ride came to an end Monday night as they dropped a thriller to Unicoi 4-3.

“I told the guys that as along as we played our best baseball, if we didn’t come out on top I didn’t mind,” said Happy Valley head coach Brad Hill. “I have said that all year, if we lose and we played good that is just baseball.

“That is what happened tonight,” Hill continued. “It was a great game back-and-forth. Both teams played great.”

The deciding run came in the bottom of the fifth. With the game tied at three and two outs, Unicoi had runners at the corners. As Happy Valley catcher Bailey Conley walked into the field to check the runner at first, Unicoi’s Caleb Wilson slipped in the back door as he stole home for the go-ahead run, putting the Blue Devils up 4-3 heading into the sixth.

From that point on the Warriors battled to pick up a tying run. In the top of the sixth, with two outs and a full count, Happy Valley’s designated hitter, Dustun Sams, almost tied things up as he blasted a triple that was just a couple feet away from being a home run. However, with Sams anxiously waiting third, Happy Valley Timmy Masters flew out to first to end the inning.

The Blue Devils held strong in the top of the seventh as they kept Warriors from making it on base ending the game and advancing themselves to the next round, where they will face off the Sullivan East today. With the 7th-seeded Patriots on an upsetting roll after beating both Elizabethton and Unicoi in the early stages of the tournament, Unicoi head coach Chad Gillis is expecting a battle this evening.

“They are a good baseball team, and they are playing well right now,” Gillis said about East. “Those guys are ready to go and are fired up to play. We have to get mentally ready to compete with those guys and their confidence right now.”

Things started on the downside for the Warriors in the first inning as they gave up two runs to the Blue Devils. Unicoi’s Owen Nicholson came to the house off a sacrafice ground out by Hunter Higgins, before Nick Fender scored on a RBI single from Putman to put Unicoi up 2-0.

However, the Warriors made things interesting in the top of the fourth as they grabbed three runs to take a 3-2 lead. Things got going when Happy Valley’s Ian Scruggs knocked in Ryne Baines with an RBI double. Scruggs came on home off an error, before Timmy Masters smacked an RBI single to bring in Justin Morefield for the go-ahead run, making the Happy Valley fans and bench go wild.

In the bottom of the fourth, Unicoi’s Owen Nicholson quickly raised the spirits of the Patriots as he bombed a deep triple to the centerfield wall, before being brought home for the tying run by a single from Putman.

For the Warriors, the postseason has been an insane ride that saw them eliminate the Elizabethton Cyclones, while almost getting an upset of the top-seeded Sullivan South Rebels, who topped Sullivan East Monday to advance to the championship.

“We played our best baseball these past four games,” said Hill. “But sometimes the breaks just don’t go your way, and they didn’t tonight. The kids played great and battled to the very last pitch.”