With two outs in the fifth inning on Friday night Grace Christian dared Greeneville lefty Will Harmon to make a play. The junior rose to the occasion and blasted a grand slam down the right field line at Dale Alexander Field that broke a tie and eventually delivered the Greene Devils a 6-2 win.
“It’s always fun to beat a good team,” Greeneville coach Andy Collins said. “They beat us last year at Cardinal Park and then they talked about it. So, it was good to have them come to our place and for us to play like this. We’ve beat a couple of good teams so far, and these games are good for us because they put us in different situations. Tonight was a different game than Providence two weeks ago, but in both games we had to execute in the right situations to win.”
Greeneville went into the bottom of the fifth inning trailing 2-0, but some of its most veteran bats stepped into the box and made some important plays. It started with senior Kobe Mundy working a full-count walk, and then senior Noah Murray breathed some life into the Devils when he traced the left-field line with a double that scored Mundy from first base.
Jeriah Griffin walked, and courtesy runner Jack Lister scored the tying run when Grace pitcher Asher Harris missed his target on a pickoff attempt. The error left first base open and the Rams chose to intentionally walk Carson Quillen. A groundout moved up both runners, and again the Rams went with the intentional pass, sending Maddox Bishop to first base without seeing a pitch.
Bishop was 2-for-2 going into the at bat, and the decision to avoid him made sense in the moment, but Harmon sure made the call sting. From the left side Harmon took a powerful swat and rocketed Harris’ final delivery of the night over the right-field wall just inside the foul pole for a grand slam.
“That was impressive from Will. I don’t how many times you are going to see someone walk a number three hitter to get to the number four hitter. It put a lot of pressure on their guy to make a pitch and I love that Will was aggressive right there. He did what we needed him to do,” Collins said.
The Rams plated both of their runs in the top of the fifth inning to take a 2-0 lead. Tyler Kiely led off the inning by pinning a double into the right field corner. Easton Housewright landed a single into centerfield, as did Mason Pike, but the Devils were able to keep the runners from getting all the way around.
With the bases loaded Greeneville erased the next two batters on a line drive to the shortstop and a strikeout.
Treyson Derry got the breakthrough run for the Rams when he legged out an infield single. The second run crossed on a wild pitch before Quillen ended the side with a strikeout.
All of Friday’s scoring occurred in the fifth inning and over the other six innings both defenses had the upper hand. That started in the first inning with Murray, Greeneville’s catcher, picking off Ben Hamilton at second base to end the inning.
Grace returned the favor in the second inning when Harris picked off Carson Norris at third on a questionable call.
In the third inning Greeneville stranded two Grace runners in scoring position, and in the fourth inning Grace left Bishop standing on third base.
Quillen earned the win on the mound on Friday. In five innings he struck out six, walked one and allowed six hits.
Harmon threw the final two frames with two strikeouts, no walks and no hits allowed.
At the plate Bishop was 2-for-2 with a double. Murray went 2-for-3 with a double and an RBI. Harmon was 1-for-3 with four RBIs. Griffin and Norris both had singles.
Harris took the loss for Grace. In 4 2/3 innings he struck out none, walked four and allowed six hits.
