BY MARK BROOOKS
West Greene and Johnson County locked horns Friday evening, in what turned out to be a good ole fashion pitcher’s duel in the District 1-2A Tournament.
West Greene’s Conner Campbell and Johnson County’s Kaden Blevins both went the distance and neither pitcher gave up an earned run, but the Longhorns came away with a 2-1 victory.
West Greene head coach Adrian Sauceman said, “Conner threw a great game, we just didn’t hit it, their guy threw a great game too, hats-off to him…it was a well played game, we just came up short”.
A second game was scheduled to immediately follow to decide who would advance to the tournament’s final game, but lightning moved into the area and forced a postponement. As of press time it is unclear when or if that game will be played. The tournament’s championship game had been scheduled for Saturday, but Johnson County coach Nick Perkins is refusing to play any game on that date.
Campbell got the first two batters of the game out on weak come-backers before Carson Jennings and Nate Dorman both singled up the middle. Grayson Espinoza drew a walk to load the bases, but Campbell caught Avery jones looking to end the threat. Campbell walked to open the bottom of the first, stole second but was caught in a rundown between second and third a few pitches later and the Buffs went down without incident.
Campbell settled down and struck out the side in the second inning. in the bottom of the side West Greene’s Braden McCamey laced a single to left field followed. Jhonen Bath and Brandon Hunter both were hit by pitches to load the bases with no outs. Jake Greene attempted to bunt McCamey in on the safety squeeze, but the bunt was to hard and right at Blevins who tossed to the catcher for the first out on the inning. Bronson Brown hit probably the hardest hit ball of the game but right to Holt who doubled up Greene at second base to end the second inning and preserve the scoreless game.
Campbell sat down the Longhorns in order in the third and fourth innings and the Buffs failed to mount anything in the bottom half of either inning themselves.
In the fifth Campbell got two quick outs before Blevins’ solid single to left field. Blevins stole second to put himself in scoring position. West Greene got Grayson Holt to hit a ground ball to third, but Hunter’s throw to first was off the mark allowing Blevins to score. Holt advanced into scoring position at second on the play. Jennings followed that with a clean single to score Holt to make the score 2-0 in favor on the Horns.
In the bottom of the fifth the Buffaloes were unable to get things going and trailed 2-0 heading to the sixth inning.
Campbell sat down the Horns in 1-2-3 fashion, but Blevins was up to the task sitting the Buffs down in order as well in the sixth frame.
In the bottom of the seventh West Greene’s Bath ran the count to 3 and 2 to open the final frame before striking out. Hunter stroked a double to right-center field to bring the tying run to the plate in Jake Greene. But Blevins was also still looking sharp and struck out Greene.
Brown hit a ball that looked like it would end the game but a fielding error by Holt allowed Hunter to score, and the Buffs had cut the lead to 2-1. Ethan Carpenter drew a walk to put the potential winning run on base. Campbell reached on yet another error by Holt to load the bases and the Buffs could win it with a base hit, but Jayden Cox hit a looping fly ball that Holt was able to handle to end the game and extend their season with the 2-1 win over West Greene.
