Photos by Jenn King
The James River baseball team will head to Stuart Friday for a Three Rivers District game with Patrick County. The Knights were scheduled to host Radford for “Senior Night” Tuesday, but results were too late for publication.
Last Saturday the Knights were able to beat the rain but they didn’t beat visiting Glenvar, losing 7-1 in a rescheduled game. That game was originally scheduled for Monday of this week but with bad weather in the forecast the game was changed to Saturday. A previously scheduled game with Waynesboro was moved to May 19 to accommodate the district game with Glenvar.
With the loss the Knights fell to 5-11 and they’re still looking for a district win. Last Thursday at home they defeated Class 5 Patrick Henry, 8-7, in a non-district thriller.
“We hit the ball really well, and while we made mistakes we had guys step up and pick each other up the whole night,” said River coach Chance Henry. “This was the best fight we have showed in a game all year. The team did a great job of not giving up and fighting together to scrap out a tough win.”
Starting pitcher Kody Park got the Knights off to a great start and pounded the zone all night. He pitched into the sixth before he was relieved by Hunter Mays with one out in the inning. Mays picked up the win when River walked it off in the bottom of the seventh.
This one was tight all the way. River led 6-2 after five innings but PH scored three in the sixth and two in the seventh to tie the game at 7-7 before River scored the deciding run. River had 10 hits with Jeremiah Mays, Hunter Mays and Maddox Moore getting two each. Carter Birchead had two RBIs.
“Getting to 10 hits is always a goal for us and the top half of our lineup really did well in driving in runs and putting the ball in play,” said Henry. “This game was also huge for our region hopes this year and it really propelled us to a decent spot. Hopefully we can win a couple more and really solidify our spot for a region game.”
