Plant game-winning hit gets Colquitt County baseball going

Published 8:31 pm Wednesday, February 14, 2018

MOULTRIE – Raines Plant’s two-run single in a six-run bottom of the fifth inning broke a 1-1 tie Wednesday and sent Colquitt County High baseball to victory in the opening game of the 2018 season. After giving up one first-inning run, Packer senior pitching – Ethan Phillips, Jared Horne and Cory Newsome – shut down the Cairo High Syrupmakers in an 8-1 final.

Plant, the starting third baseman for head coach Tony Kirkland and a left-handed hitter, stood at the plate with the bases loaded in the home half of the fifth. Gavin Patel, also a senior infielder in the Colquitt County lineup, found a hole rolling a single to left field to give the Packers two baserunners with nobody out. The turn wasn’t progressing, though, as Kirkland would hope, for Cairo fielded Dylan Dalton’s bunt for a force out at third base.

But the first pitch from Hayes Stills to Tanner Wilson got a piece of the senior outfielder, so Wilson went to first to set things up for Plant. On the first pitch from Stills, Plant pulled a single to right. Patel and Dalton scored, Dalton doing what he could leaping to avoid a play at home.

Cairo coaches made a pitching change when Stills hit Newsome to reload the bags. Things only got worse for the visitors as, in order, Mack Crosby, Alex Bledsoe and Phillips drew walks. With the score now 6-1 in favor of the Packers, junior outfielder Tucker Hathcock faced the third Maker pitcher and drove in the sixth run on a long fly to right.

Spectators who arrived to the early 3:30 p.m. start saw a pitcher’s dual for four innings between Phillips and Stills. It was a game where the trend was for lead-off batters to reach base, but even with that high percentage scoring chance there was only one run for each side through four complete. Phillips completed those first four innings giving up just two hits, walking three and fanning four.

Horne was the winning pitcher with a scoreless top of the fifth with two hits allowed and one strikeout. Newsome finished off the last two frames by retiring all six batters he faced, four on whiffs.

Cairo struck first, however, in scoring as JT Andrews led off singling on the season’s first pitch on Ike Aultman Field at Jerry Croft Stadium. Andrews was on third base when Newsome – starting at first base – made a tough catch of a foul ball. The Syrupmaker tagged up and scored.

The Packers went through some unlucky stretches of offense, which included being the victim of two unconventional double plays. Patel and Wilson each had infield singles in the bottom of the first. Both were in scoring position via an error with two outs, but Stills fanned Newsome.

Phillips stranded Cairo’s runner on third in the top of the second with a swinging strikeout. Crosby, Kirkland’s senior catcher, was successful on his first caught-stealing throw in the third, and that inning ended on Phillips’ called third strike.

Patel is bound to be responsible for several Ozzie Smith-like plays at shortstop before he heads to Gordon State College. He helped Phillips get away with two walks in the top of the fourth by diving for a line drive and flipping the baseball to Dalton for Colquitt’s lone double play.

Double plays hurt Packer scoring chances in both the second and third, one of them wasting Hathcock’s first-pitch lead off double.

In the home fourth, Plant’s one-out single ignited the tying rally. Newsome grounded the ball to third base, and that led to a throwing error. Crosby went the opposite way on a 1-2 pitch bringing home Plant for 1-1.

In Horne’s one inning on the mound, Ethan Godwin and Conner Johnson singled for Cairo. The sidearming Horne, however, struck out designated hitter Chance Scott swinging on 3-2.

Newsome doubled with two outs driving in the eighth Packer run. That was in the bottom of the sixth, a turn where sophomore centerfielder Garrett Gainous of the Makers dove to make his own highlight catch.

LIGHTS OUT

Colquitt County’s varsity baseball season opener was rescheduled twice, first from Monday, Feb. 12, to Wednesday due to the rain from both Sunday and Monday. On Wednesday, it was announced the game would start at 3:30 instead of 5:45 p.m. due to a burned out transformer. This meant the lights at Ike Aultman Field will not work.

That means there are more schedule changes for the Packers, the biggest one being the location of Friday’s non-region game vs. Coffee. That game will be in Douglas at 4 p.m. instead of at home.

On Monday, Hillgrove High is visiting from Atlanta to play two games. The first game against Tift County will start at noon instead of 1 p.m. The Packers take on Hillgrove afterwards.

The next home action would then be the Georgia-Florida Challenge Feb. 23 at Packer Park.