Photo by Leigh Downey
The James River baseball team will play their last three regular season games on the road, all against Three Rivers District teams. The Knights were scheduled to play at Floyd County Tuesday of this week, at Patrick County Friday and at Carroll County a week from today, on May 20.
River comes into the week with a 7-9 record and a 3-4 mark in the tough Three Rivers District. The Knights split two games last week as they fell to Glenvar, but bounced back to beat Bath County, both by 10-0 scores.
Glenvar has been one of the hottest teams in the greater Roanoke Valley and the Highlanders were hitting on all cylinders last week in Springwood. The visitors scored in four of the five innings and held the Knights to two hits, one each by Carter Birckhead and Merit Hammons.
“Sometimes you don’t play well and get beat,” said River coach Chance Henry. “We rely on our pitching and defense to win and we just didn’t have it. Just gotta wipe it and move on to the next game.”
Which is exactly what the Knights did, turning the score around for a 10-0 slaughter rule win over Bath County in Hot Springs last Friday. Cam Saunders and Colt Cook combined for a no-hitter, with Saunders pitching the first four and a third innings and striking out 11. Cook got the last two outs, one by strikeout.
“Cam Saunders threw great,” said Henry. “He attacked the zone the whole game. When we pitch like that and make the routine plays we can beat anyone.”
Jeremiah Mays had two hits, scored twice and drove in two runs to lead the offense. Birckhead drove in three and Levi Peck scored three times. River scored in four of the five innings.
“Hopefully this will give us some momentum heading into our final regular season games,” said Henry.
