MONTGOMERY, Ala. – It didn’t happen until the eighth inning, but Georgia Southern’s hitters finally came to life and sent the Eagles to the Guardian Credit Union Sun Belt Baseball Championship presented by Troy University title game.
Seven hits and seven runs in the final two innings broke up a 1-0 pitchers’ duel as second-seeded Georgia Southern posted an 8-0 victory over sixth-seeded Troy in Saturday’s first semifinal game.
“We really had to work for that one today,” said Eagle coach Rodney Hennon. “You look at the score, that’s a much closer game today than what that score shows.”
No kidding. In fact, until that eighth inning, it appeared that the difference between the Eagles (40-17) and the Trojans was a fifth-inning unearned run. But a one-out walk to Noah Ledford and Austin Thompson’s double just out of the reach of right fielder Trey Leonard set up Jarrett Brown’s two-run single, and Parker Biederer and J. P. Tighe followed with RBI hits to give Georgia Southern a 5-0 lead.
Brown also had a run-scoring double in the ninth just before Sam Blancato provided an exclamation point with a two-run homer to right field.
“You’re looking at a 1-0 game with five outs left, and if we potentially make a play it’s four outs left and it’s 1-0,” said first-year Troy coach Skylar Meade. “Maybe you lose, maybe you don’t, but if you lose you lose, if you win you win, you don’t really care what the final score ends up being.”
Georgia Southern, advancing to Sunday’s 1 p.m. championship game against the Texas State-Louisiana winner, had 13 hits in the game. But it was the pitching of starter Hayden Harris and reliever Ben Johnson that kept the Eagles close until the breakout final two innings.
Harris allowed leadoff singles to Troy’s Jesse Hall and Kyle Mock before striking out three in a row, and gave up only one hit before the Trojans (32-24) rallied in the fourth on William Sullivan’s leadoff double and an infield hit from Clay Stearns. Easton Kirk then hit a scalding line drive, but right at Eagle second baseman Jesse Sherrill, who doubled off Sullivan.
Johnson then came on and got the final out on a fly ball, and gave up only three singles the rest of the way in facing only four over the minimum.
“Throw the regular season out the window, it’s a new season and I gotta go,” said Harris, who had only thrown 25 innings in the regular season. “Coach told me to go today. I had gotten ahead of both of those first hitters, so it was like stay confident, make your pitches, trust what is calling and that’s what I did.”
“It’s a testament to our defense,” said Johnson (5-3). “All the pitchers are confident in our defense. We know if we just get in there and fill it up, good things are going to happen.”
Troy starter Garrett Gainous (5-4) did not allow a runner past first base through the first four innings, striking out five, before Blancato had a two-out double and moved to third on a wild pitch. With two outs, Jesse Sherrill’s routine ground ball was mishandled by shortstop Jesse Hall as Blancato scored.
That was the only run and the only threat by either team until the Eagles erupted in the eighth. Prior to that, Georgia Southern was 0-for-6 with runners in scoring position and neither team had given up an earned run.
“I thought they (Troy) got a tremendous effort from Gainous,” Hennon said. “We did not see him during the regular season so I’m sure nobody knew what to expect from him. Fortunately for us, Hayden matched him, and then Ben coming in behind Hayden was just terrific as well. They did a good job of getting ahead all day long, and then we were finally able to get the big hit from Jarrett Brown in the eighth and some big two-out hits to extend the lead.”