ECBL: Gators deal Saints' three-run loss

By Cam Ellis
Published in Sports on July 2, 2015 1:48 PM

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DUDLEY -- Signs indicating the end of the summer baseball season were everywhere at Southern Wayne on Wednesday afternoon.

There was a smaller crowd and smaller teams.

What should have been a doubleheader between Eastern Carolina Baseball League foes Spring Creek and Southern Wayne was reduced to one seven-inning game.

So each team took care of business.

Playing with a younger roster that included players out of position, Southern Wayne dropped its regular-season finale, 8-5, to the Gators.

The Saints got off to a good start after starting pitcher Josh Jernigan escaped a bases-loaded, one-out jam in the top of the first inning. Facing the heart of Spring Creek's order, Jernigan struck out Josh Lebron and Landon Smothers to escape unharmed.

In the bottom half, Cole Barwick and Dylan Whitley each reached base on via a lead-off walk and a hit-by-pitch, respectively. Two wild pitches from Gators' starter Will Rouse and a RBI groundout from Jernigan later put Southern Wayne ahead 2-0.

The lead wouldn't last long, though.

Jernigan and the Saints' defense unraveled in the third inning. The Gators struck for six runs on six hits with one error. Jernigan was on the wrong end of some bad luck, too -- several of the Gators' six hits didn't leave the infield.

"I had a lot of young guys playing infield positions and key positions tonight," said Southern Wayne head coach Anthony Williams, a University of Mount Olive alum. "I had to tell my starting pitcher when he's at the varsity level, a lot of those plays are routine balls.

"Not taking care of the baseball was what killed us."

Southern Wayne played a strong second half of the game and scored three runs -- one in each inning. All five runs came against Spring Creek's Rouse, who went the distance on the mound.

"He was good, he's our ace," Gators head coach Alan Nichols said. "He did not have his best stuff today. In fact his back was bothering him, but he's a bulldog.

"He didn't want to come out. I had a man warming up, but he wanted to go out there and finish it and he threw strikes and the defense worked good enough for him."

Levi Miller, Casey Whitfield, Kane Geelen and Matt Dupuy all got into the action with RBI hits for the Gators.

"We didn't start swinging the bats until later, we should have swung them earlier," Nichols added. "We loaded the bases in the first couple of innings and didn't get anything out of it, and I told them that we needed to swing the bats. Once we started swinging the bats and putting stuff in play, we made stuff happen."

It was the regular-season finale for both teams. Williams and Nichols saw positive progression from their respective teams during the four-week season.

"I'm happy with this season," Nichols said. "Last season we were like 8-11, but we came around and played better and had good numbers. This helps our varsity team going into the spring. This is where we develop."

"We had a great year," Williams added. "I've seen a lot of guys grow, I've seen them become habit forming. It's been a good year, I've enjoyed it."