It was a big night for baseball on Friday night and Ragsdale has won the Mid-Piedmont 3-A conference tournament with a 10-0 whipping of Southeast Guilford and Southwest Guilford stopped WS Reagan 9-2 to claim the Piedmont Triad 3-A title…Northwest Guilford topped Grimsley at Grimsley 8-5 in the semifinals of the Metro 4-A conference tourney and East Forsyth rolled over Page in 5 innings, 10-0, in Kernersville. NWG(17-7) will meet East Forsyth(19-4) on Monday night in K’ville for the Metro conference championship. Rotation expections would say Robbie McIntosh will start for NWG on Monday evening at EF in the finals.
Western Alamance defeated Norhteast Guilford 6-5 and Bartlett Yancey topped Dudley 5-4 in round one of the Triad 3-A tourney back on Thursday at the higher seeded teams home fields. Last night the Triad 3-A moved to Stoner-White Stadium at Jaycee Park for their conference semis.
One of the biggest, if not the biggest win in school history, is what Ragsdale coach Donnie Maness is saying about his Tigers’ 10-0 win over Southeast in the championship game at Eastern Randolph in Ramseur. Ragsdale threw Kyle Brandenburg against SEG on Friday and the SEG Falcons just couldn’t hit KB. Brandenburg tossed a two-hitter and he was named the tournament MVP in what is being called the biggest win in Ragsdale school history. I saw Brandenburg in one game this season and he looked very good and obviously he gave Ragsdale a look last night that the SEG Falcons were not ready for and Ragsdale wins the title. Brandenburg is also an excellent shortstop and SEG could do nothing with Kyle who was doing it in style last night for the champion Tigers. Ben Fultz 4-4, Nick McBride 2-3 with 3RBI’s, and DeSean Anderson 2-3 with 3 runs scored, all came up big-time for the Tigers.
Let’s get some discussion going. Which is bigger, the regular season championship(SOUTHEAST GUILFORD) or the conference tournament title(RAGSDALE)????? Again, Coach Maness was telling our sources last night at about 9:25pm, that this was the biggest win in Ragsdale baseball history…..Congrats to both the TIGERS and the FALCONS, but who has the better hand right now?????
Southwest Guilford behind the pitching of the young man that we have been talking about all week, Esterlin Paulino, won the Piedmont Triad 3-A title decisively over Reagan 9-2. SWG was led in hitting by Jeremy Hall who was listed as going 3-3 in the Winston-Salem Journal and Hall was tabbed to have gone 3-4 in the News and Record with 2RBI’S. SWG also had help from Christian McLean 3-4 with 3RBI’s and a double, Will Kellam who went 3-4, Brock Hudgens and Nick Shields were 2-3, and Mitchell Frazier was 1-3 and he caught Paulino and then Ethan Ogburn who came into the game in the 7th inning to close it out for SWG.
Will we see SWG and Ragsdale going at it against each other in round two of the playoffs? It’s been that way over the past couple of seasons.
In the radio game over at Grimsley I ran into several people who said they are now hooked on GREENSBOROSports.com and it is a part of their daily diet. Debbie Faircloth said she had a story coming our way soon about a bunch of the local kids that played together on a travel team a few years back with Andrew Faircloth, Andrew Justice, David Coffey, Kyle Brandenburg, Naeen Marrero, and many others who are now all starting for their respective high schools and they were all together as little kids….(Or maybe younger kids, we should say…)
In the game, Northwest Guilford found a way to stay the course with starting pitcher Logan Self going the distance and the Vikings winning at Grimsley 8-5. NWG went up early 3-0 on Self’s three-run HR and later Alex Swim had a three-run double for the Vikings and Swim finished 4-4 for the night. Even though NWG jumped out in front early, the Whirlies cut into the NWG lead and tied the game at 3-3 in the bottom of the second. NWG went up 4-3 and raced out to the 7-3 lead on Swim’s big double and the Vikings were poised to claim another victory over the Whirlies. In the season series for 2008, NWG is up 2-1 over Grimsley and we might see these teams meeting again in the playoffs, we did last year with a round-three matchup at Grimsley.
It was an excellent effort by Logan Self and Tommy Houston made a great play or two at second base for NWG and the Vikings center fielder Seth Hannner robbed Pat Oescli of a hit right after Pat had taken a hit away from NWG with the catch-of-the-game in right field in the middle innings. This was another battle between two schools that respect each other and this time NWG wins the war. NWG will be set to send Robbie McIntosh out to the mound on Monday night against Ryan Dull(11-1) and East Forsyth. Grimsley just recently beat EF and Dull, 9-0, and with NWG beating the Whirlies last night, you have to think that NWG can beat EF too.
For the Whirlies on Friday freshman LHP George Carter got the start and he got relief help from Kevin Rose. Rose came in around the 5th inning and he battled with the Vikings. Carter didn’t have his best stuff but sometimes you learn some things in a loss and this might be one of those nights. Andrew Faircloth was 2-3 with a double and 2RBI’s for Grimsley, Matt Nettesheim had a hit and a couple of RBI’s(plus he was sporting a temperature of 103 earlier in the day on Friday), and Andrew Justice and Cal Sutphin both went 2-4 for the Whirlies and Sutphin helped start and turn a key double-play late in the game with runners on the corners for NWG, and that helped get Rose off the hook and it kept the score within striking distance for Grimsley. On second thought, the bases may have been loaded at that point for NWG, I don’t have my scorebook with me and this is all coming straight from the heart, here in today’s post.
Heart-to-heart, the Northwest Guilford fans were really into this game and they were making some noise and it made for a playoff-type atmosphere. The McCallie-Young Field/Stadium was packed and the Grimsley-NWG baseball games are becoming classics. The two teams have now met 7 times over the past two seasons and NWG leads the 2007/2008 series 5-2 and Grimsley won the conference tournament semifinals at NWG in 2007 and now NWG returns the favor and wins at Grimsley in 2008. Like I was saying earlier, I met few of the GREENSBOROSports.com readers before the game and one was a nice young girl who I believe is Jon Wilkinson’s sister and she is good friends with the Nettesheim family. I may have the families switched around, but she did say she reads the site and it is a good thing for her and her friends.
A key comment on last night’s game from a Northwest Guilford fan on the play by Logan Self backing up the NWG catcher Eric Presnell on a throw in from right field…..This fan is right on the money, it was a great play, especially on the part of Self….The comment:
Strong defense, aggressive offense, and strong fan support were the keys to Northwest winning the game over Grimsley Friday night in the 3rd meeting between the two teams. A key defensive play took place in the 4th inning with Grimsley runners on 1st and 2nd and no outs. A hit was delivered to the outfield by the Grimsley batter and the NW pitcher Logan Self immediately ran to back up the throw to the plate. The throw sailed over the NW catcher’s head ( Eric Presnell) and into Logan Self’s glove who immediately through a strike to NW 3rd baseman Robbie McIntosh. McIntosh applied the tag to a Grimsley runner who had moved too far down the 3rd base line. Rather than having the bases loaded with no outs, NW had one out with two Grimsley runners still at 1st and 2nd. Players must know where to be in game situations, and Self and McIntosh were right on spot.
Other quick notes, Mount Tabor defeated West Forsyth 5-4 last night in the Central Piedmont 4-A tournament. This was the semis and Mount Tabor will play North Davidson for the title at West Forsyth on Monday night.
What about WESTERN GUILFORD in the Triad 3-A tournament at Stoner-White Stadium? We know that Dudley, Northeast Guilford, and Northern Guilford all lost in the first round but what about about the Hornets of WG?
Southeast Guilford could meet Southwest Guilford in round two of the State 3-A playoffs in the West brackets based on what we are seeing early on, and Ragsdale may have to travel to Glenn in round number two in the West. SEG and SWG met in game number two back early in the 2008 season at SWG and SEG was the winner and SWG had Esterlin Paulino on the hill. In the playoffs, the game would be at SEG…..
just curious about the poll, THE EDGE OF WHAT?
Dull will not be starting on the mound against Northwest. Sophomore Shane Dickerson (4-0) will be on the hill for the game…look for Dull to close the game out though and he is 10-1 on the year.
what is the EDGE?