The Savannah Christian baseball team rather quickly took all the suspense out of its opening-round state playoff series with St. Francis on Friday.
The host Raiders swept the doubleheader by mercy-rule outcomes, 12-2 in five innings in Game 1 and 20-0 in three innings in Game 2 against the squad from Alpharetta.
The combined eight innings took about 3 hours – not including a 40-minute break in between. Savannah Christian, seeded seventh, will host the second round of the GHSA Private playoffs on May 1-2 against the winner of No. 23 Mount Vernon and No. 10 Hebron Christian, which split their Friday doubleheader and play Game 3 on Saturday afternoon.
The Raiders (20-12), conversely, will have Saturday off instead of facing a season-ending scenario in a best-of-three series.
“You always want to sweep,” said SCPS senior left-hander Dawson Kelly, who played center field in Game 1 and pitched Game 2. “You know what the consequences of winning or losing that game (3) are. You just want to go and take care of business the first day and not be in that situation.”
Savannah Christian coach Matthew Oglesby said his team has struggled to put teams away in such a fashion, so it was good to open the playoffs that way.
“It’s not like (St. Francis) really gave it to us,” Oglesby said. “We actually hit the ball pretty well. When you hit it where they ain’t, it’s easy to score runs.”
The Raiders had nine hits in their four stanzas in Game 1, including Cardin Patrick’s blast over the left-field fence to lead off a four-run fourth inning. Patrick had been victimized in recent games by hitting it where they are, but no fielder was catching his home run.
“He’s had a little bit of a run of bad luck,” Oglesby said. “He’s probably had the best swings on balls the last couple of weeks and not a lot to show for it. So it’s good to see him get one elevated a little bit and get one out of here.”
St. Francis (10-21), which, like SCPS, entered with a four-game winning streak, was seeded 26. The Knights notched a first-inning single to open Game 1 but wouldn’t get another hit off Raiders starter Harding Dennis until the fifth inning when they unsuccessfully tried to stave off getting a 10-run rule.
Dennis, a senior lefty like his stepbrother Kelly, struck out eight batters, walked four, and hit one while yielding two runs and two hits in five innings.
“For the first four innings, my control was pretty good. I got a lot of first-pitch strikes,” Harding said. “Control helps.”
So does run support. The Raiders pushed across one run at the bottom of the first on Athen Hudspeth’s leadoff, which was a single, stolen base, with a wild pitch and Patrick’s sacrifice fly.
Five more runs were manufactured in the second on a hit batter, walk, bunt single, passed ball, hit batsman, walk, and – after a pitching change – Hudspeth smacking the first pitch over the left fielder’s head for a bases-clearing double and 6-0 lead.
Kelly drove in two runs with a single in the third for 8-0. Patrick’s blast in the fifth was followed by a walk, a one-out hit batter, a sharply hit single for bases loaded, another hit batter, Kelly’s sacrifice fly, yet another hit batter, and a bases-loaded walk to Jiwoo Hong for 12-0.
“We were patient at the plate,” Dennis said. “When they did throw one in, we hit it pretty hard. And (we) executed when runners are in scoring position.”
Dennis got a bit wild with his pitches after one out in the fifth, walking two batters, making a bad pickoff first to allow the Knights’ first run, and hitting a batter before yielding an RBI double. He struck out two in the inning, which Oglesby hopes will be a learning experience if the senior pitches in the same scenario again.
Also informative – and likely worrisome for upcoming opponents – is Dennis is throwing harder in winning his last two starts.
Dennis missed a big chunk of the season after taking a line-drive comebacker to his face in the February 21 game against Prince Avenue Christian. He sustained seven fractures in his face but somehow didn’t need surgery, only recovery time to heal and the ability to get back on the mound.
He returned to action on March 4 as a designated hitter and later pitched while wearing a softball mask as protection. Last week, he pitched in a game without the mask, as he did on Friday.
“I can probably amp it up a little bit more,” said Dennis, explaining, “You’ve got to try to keep the mask on, so you can’t really throw as hard. Since then, I’ve been able to throw a little bit harder.”
Batting around and around
Oglesby, who said Dennis is more confident and comfortable pitching, turned to Kelly for Game 2 when SCPS was the road team.
Kelly allowed two hits and no walks with five strikeouts in three shutout innings.
“I was just going up there and filled the (strike) zone, and my defense did the work. We came out on top.”
The Raiders’ offense picked up where it left off, with a lot of help from the Knights’ fielders in the top of the first.
Two throwing errors were followed by Patrick’s RBI double, then Dennis hit a high popup that was bungled when two St. Francis fielders collided in shallow left field, allowing another run. Patrick scored on a wild pitch, and after an infield single and hit batsman, Jack Stahl crushed a two-run double.
After batting around in the first, SCPS sent 19 runners to the plate in the second inning and scored 13 runs. Hong batted three times, and Dennis pulled a three-run homer over the right-field fence, then walked with two runners on as he didn’t get a pitch to hit.
The Raiders added two runs in the third on Will White’s two-out, two-run single. White, among many players who came in as reserves in Game 2, also had an RBI double in the second.
“Everyone’s on fire right now,” Kelly said. “We’re all hitting anything. I feel like anything in that zone, one through nine (in the batting order) is hitting the ball well right now. That’s good to know going into the playoffs. Hopefully, we can keep carrying that on to the next round.”
Oglesby said the Raiders have battled through injuries since the preseason and are about as healthy as they’ve been all year.
“I think we’re peaking at the right time,” Oglesby said. “We’re playing good baseball. They’re having a lot of fun. The group is kind of inseparable. They’re always together, and that’s a good thing. They’ve got good team chemistry.”
| GAME 1 | ||||||||||
| SCPS 12, St. Francis 2 (5 innings) | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | R | H | E |
| St. Francis | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | - | - | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| SCPS | 1 | 5 | 2 | 4 | X | - | - | 12 | 9 | 0 |
| GAME 2 | ||||||||||
| SCPS 20, St. Francis 0 (3 innings) | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | R | H | E |
| SCPS | 5 | 13 | 2 | - | - | - | - | 20 | 16 | 0 |
| St. Francis | 0 | 0 | 0 | - | - | - | - | 0 | 2 | 4 |
|
Records—St. Francis 10-21, Savannah Christian 20-12. |
FINAL SCORES
GHSA BASEBALL FIRST ROUND
Class 6A – Etowah 6, 7 | Richmond Hill 5, 2 – Richmond Hill Eliminated
Class 5A – Effingham County 3, 13 | East Paulding 1, 5 – Effingham Advances
Class 4A – Marist 14, 11 | Benedictine 0, 1 – Benedictine Eliminated
Class 1A Division II – Wilcox County 4, 14 | Bryan County 2, 6 – Bryan County Eliminated
Class 3A: Northwest Whitfield 10,11, | Islands 9,1 - Islands Eliminated
Class 3A-1A Private - Calvary Day 13,11 | Mount Pisgah Christian 2,0 - Calvary Advances
Class 3A-1A Private - Savannah Christian 12, 20, | St. Francis 2,0 - Savannah Christian Advances
Class 3A-1A Private - Holy Innocents’ 13,17, | Savannah Country Day 1,0 - Savannah Country Day Eliminated
SAVANNAH AREA TEAMS IN ROUND TWO MATCHUPS
(Tuesday-Wednesday)
CLASS 5A - (R8 #2) Winder-Barrow at (R1 #1) Effingham County - TIME TBA
(Thursday-Friday)
CLASS 3A-1A Private - (#13) Whitefield Academy at (#4) Calvary Day - TIME TBA
CLASS 3A-1A Private -(#23) Mount Vernon/(#10) Hebron Christian winner at (#7) Savannah Christian - TIME TBA
PHOTO CREDIT: Prep Sports Report
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