Day Two - NC American Legion Baseball State Tournament
August 9th, 2007 Posted in American Legion baseball
Day two started off with a bang, as Durham Legion eliminated the defending North Carolina Legion champions, Morehead City Legion. That was followed by an elimination game between two of NC’s four regular season area champions - Wayne County Legion and Randolph County Legion - with Wayne County prevailing. The two upcoming night games look promising as well - historical powerhouses Rowan County Legion and Cherryville Legion face off first, followed by home favorite Garner Legion taking on Caldwell County Legion.
First Session Summaries
(complete coverage including photo and video highlights is at our home page for the state playoffs)
Game 1 - Durham Legion surges late to defeat defending champs Morehead City Legion by a score of 5-3.
Durham opened up the scoring by getting one in the first and one in the second off of Morehead City starting pitcher Lonnie Chisenhall. Morehead City fought back with two runs back in the third to tie the score at two, and then seized the lead in the fourth when they scored another run. The game stayed 3-2 until the eighth inning when Morehead City took out starter Lonnie Chisenhall, going to the bullpen and giving Durham an opportunity to get their offense going. In the eighth, Durham got some help from Morehead City, as Morehead made a critical one-out error. A walk to the next hitter set the table for Durham’s sluggers to break the game open. Durham’s Tarron Robinson came through with a huge hit, connecting on a pitch to drive it into the left center gap for a double that scored both runners, giving Durham the lead. Cameron Falcon followed with a big hit of his own - roping a double to score Robinson and give Durham a 5-3 lead. Morehead City could not come back, so their defense of the 2006 State Championship is over, as they are eliminated from the tournament, finishing their season with a record of 29 wins to 5 losses. Durham advances to face the loser of the Garner Legion vs. Caldwell County Legion game being played later tonight.
Game 2 - Area I Champion Wayne County Legion eliminates Area III Champion Randolph County Legion by a score of 9-4.
Wayne County (photo above) came out of the gates red hot as Wayne’s lead off hitter Jackson Massey took a curveball that was up in the zone and blasted it over the right field wall for a lead off homer. Walker Gourley followed him with a double and scored on a Garrett Davis single. Randolph County got on the board in the third as Justin Yow roped a double and then was driven in by a Hayes single. Randolph got another run in the fourth to tie the score at 2. Randolph starting pitcher Tyler McSwain seemed to tire in the fifth inning as Wayne plated two runs before McSwain was relieved by Seth Isaacs. The Wayne County hitters rolled from there, scoring three runs in the sixth, and two more in the seventh. Randolph’s powerful lineup meanwhile couldn’t get the timely hits, as their promising season came to an end. Randolph County finishes with a record of 38 wins and 15 losses. Wayne County moves on to face the loser of the Rowan County vs. Cherryville game being played later tonight.
Second Session
Game 3 - Cherryville rallies to beat Rowan County by a score of 8-7.
Photo: Cherryville Legion
Cherryville scored first, but then fell behind as Rowan scored one in the third, and three more in the fourth. In a big Rowan fourth, DC Cranford hit a two run home run and then Matt Hall drove in a run on a single. Rowan got two more in the sixth with help from two Cherryville errors. Cherryville came storming back with four in the bottom half of the inning, including two key run scoring singles from Finger and Watts. Rowan starter Keegan Linza left at the start of the inning after being dominant through the first five. Cherryville then took the lead in the seventh on two more run scoring singles from Finger and Hoyle. Rowan bounced back to get a run in the eighth to tie the score up. Cherryville got a walk off run scoring single from Jake Watts to win the ball game in the ninth to advance them in the winner’s bracket, and send Rowan County to a Friday elimination game against Wayne County in the loser’s bracket. The Shelby Star has a good game summary posted.
Game 4 - Caldwell County surges late to beat Garner by a score of 8-4.
Photo: Caldwell County Legion
Garner riding the momentum of their first round victory seemed to come out with nothing to lose, even after falling behind early when Caldwell scored two in the bottom of the first. Garner answered promptly with one in the top of the second, but Caldwell got two more to take a 4-1 lead. Garner steadily battled back, scoring a run in the third, another in the fifth, and then tying the game at 4-4 in the sixth. However, Caldwell surged in the late innings, scoring two runs in the seventh on a wild pitch and a Nelson RBI single, and kept it going in the eighth on a huge Brad Chavis two run home run to kill Garner’s spirit, and send them to an elimination game Friday against Durham Legion. Caldwell goes on to face Cherryville on Friday, in a rematch from the Area IV championship series.
[Where: Garner, NC]
2 Responses to “Day Two - NC American Legion Baseball State Tournament”
By Jere Morton on Aug 10, 2007
These brackets were not drawn up. The bracket that the NC State Championship Tourney uses is used throughout the country. The bracket comes straight from the National American Legion Baseball Department.
http://www.baseball.legion.org/brackets.htm
Bracket is fine. Lots of very good baseball going on here in Garner. Only problem is Wayne Co. playing at 12:30 the first 3 days but that’s the way it goes sometime. Today’s 12:30 game should have been played at 9:30am but I don’t make those decisions.
- Jere Morton
Director, ‘07 NC American Legion State Championship