By Shannon Fagan, WEIS Sports Director
CEDAR BLUFF – Through the years, the Cedar Bluff Tigers and Spring Garden Panthers have played some interesting baseball games, but none have been quite like the one they played Friday evening.
With the game tied at 2 in the bottom of the fourth inning, Bryson Teague walked to lead things off for the Tigers. He eventually scored the go-ahead run from third on an errant pick-off attempt.
In the top of the fifth, Spring Garden scored two unearned runs on a pair of Tiger errors to take a 4-3 lead. In the bottom half, Panther starting pitcher Carson Bostick retired the first two Cedar Bluff batters, but then a steady rain began to set in. Bostick faced one more batter in Kuper Bradley, who singled to right to keep the inning going for the Tigers.
The rain didn’t let up, forcing the umpires to call for a delay. After a few minutes, they met with Cedar Bluff coach Colby Coursey and Spring Garden coach Kyle Garmon. They all mutually agreed to call the game.
According to Alabama High School Athletic Association procedure, if the umpires call a game for weather, and the home team has scored an equal or greater number of runs in four or four and a fraction turns at bat than the visiting team has scored in five turns at-bat, then it is a regulation game.
Therefore, Cedar Bluff was awarded a 3-2 victory on its senior night for Isaac Bishop, Jacob Chambers, Caleb Edmondson and Hunter Stallings.
“It was a crazy game,” Coursey said. “They had a good pick-off play (in the bottom of the fourth inning). I just think they had some miscommunication. Bryson did a good job there. The ball got away and we had a chance to score there with two outs. We’re really good on bases when we want to be and putting pressure on teams, especially when you’ve got good batters up there.”
“If you look at the scoreboard, it’s 4-3, but if you go back to the last completed inning, it’s 3-2,” Garmon said. “They can leave happy knowing if it goes back to the last reverted inning they get the win. We can leave happy because we know there was two outs in the fifth inning and we were winning, but that’s not the point. The point of this time of year is to prepare for the playoffs. We were able to do that today, so I’m happy.”
Left-hander Kolwyn Morrison earned the win for the Tigers. He surrendered just three hits and three walks with a pair of strikeouts. Bostick took the loss after allowing just four hits and four walks with four strikeouts.
“Kolwyn pitched really good,” Coursey said. “We had a couple of mistakes that last inning that hurt us a little bit, but for the most part we were pretty clean defensively. We had some good at-bats. Carson (Bostick) is hard to hit off of. He keeps you off-balance. He’s got a good fastball. His knuckle curve ball works. It’s hard to get ahead in the count on him and stay ahead.”
Garmon said he wanted the Panthers to see a left-handed arm before hosting Pickens Academy in the first round of the Class 1A state playoffs on Friday.
“I figured they would pitch Kolwyn today,” Garmon said. “We’ve only seen one all year, and we had a hard time hitting that kid. I thought we hit the ball well today. We got what we needed to get out of today. We got several at-bats against a good left-handed arm. What we didn’t need was somebody getting hurt in this mess (on the field). We got what we needed out of it and I hope he (Coursey) did too. At this point, this is about preparing for the playoffs.”
After an hour and seven minute rain delay to begin Friday’s game, Spring Garden took a 2-0 lead in the top of the first inning on a two-run double by Connor Bates. Cedar Bluff got a run back in the bottom half on a bases-loaded walk to Bishop that scored Samson Mallett, who doubled with one out.
The Tigers tied the game at 2 in the bottom of the second on a towering home run shot to center field by Edmondson.
“He got a fastball middle half and didn’t miss it,” Coursey said. “That’s probably one of the furthest home runs I’ve seen at this ball field ever, and I’ve seen quite a few games here coaching against and with Cedar Bluff. That was a big spark for us, and I think it kind of sparked Kolwyn a little bit.”
Cedar Bluff took a 3-2 lead in the bottom of the fourth on Teague’s heads-up base running.
Bates, Zane Edwards and John Welsh had the Panther hits.
“That’s a solid group,” Coursey said of the Panthers. “They’ve been together for a long time and I hope they make a lot of noise in the playoffs. They’ve got a chance to go far. They’ve got the arms and they swing it well enough too.”
Cedar Bluff will be traveling to Decatur Heritage in the 2A state playoffs, also next Friday.
