They say that after winning a state title, your team becomes targeted. Well, that looked to be the case all throughout the year as every opponent that the Greeneville baseball played, gave them their best… That even spilled over into the opening round of the TSSAA class 3A state tournament, but this time, it was not only the Signal Mountain Eagles, but also the Smyrna High School lighting system. With a 6:30 start on the schedule, it was deemed that the there was a malfunction in the lights, leaving both teams in limbo of even getting the game started. Following a discussion with game administrators, both coaches, and TSSAA officials, it was decided to move the teams to Blackman high school to begin the opening round match-up. The only problem with the venue change was that two teams were already playing, and another wait would ensue.
Once the game got underway, at approximately 10:00pm, both Carson Quillen, a Virginia Tech commit, and Benjamin Timblin, a Wofford signee, looked to push their team to victory. In the end, it would be Quillen, who got the upper hand and helped the Devils advance with the 4-1 victory.
The Greene Devils got things going in the bottom of the first when Quillen would advance to second as his towering flyball was misplayed by the centerfielder. He would come around to score the game’s first run on a Colton Richards’ single. Richards advanced to second on a passed ball and came around to score when Kaine Ricker doubled to right center, making the score 2-0.
Greeneville continually put runners on base in the second, third, and fourth innings, and threatened to open the game up, but some baserunning mistakes and some timely pitching halted any scoring threats and kept the game close.
In the bottom of the fifth, Richards collected his third hit of the evening, a triple to right. With a 3-0 count on Ricker, the incoming pitch, which was called a strike got by the catcher, allowing Richards to come home and make the score 3-0.
Quillen would face the most adversity of the evening in the top of the sixth when back to back walks, followed by a double, allowed Signal Mountain to get on the board at 3-1 and have the tying run at second. The Greene Devil junior would coax the next hitter into a fly-out, followed by the 10th strikeout of the contest to end the rally.
Greeneville pushed across an insurance run in the bottom of the sixth on a Maddox Bishop RBI single, making the score 4-1 and sending the Greene Devils on into the winner’s bracket to face South Gibson at 12:30 on Wednesday.
