Published: April 23, 2008 02:24 pm            

Lake warms up at plate in series sweep

LAKE — Lake baseball coach Brian Goodman doesn’t know why his team exploded for 41 hits in their last three games. Maybe it was him fussing about it all the time or perhaps it was just the playoffs.

Whatever the reason, he hopes the Hornets keep on doing it.

The Hornets swept Enterprise-Lincoln in the first round of the Class 2A playoffs on Saturday by scores of 15-3 and 11-2 to advance to second-round action.

“That’s the best we’ve swung the bats all year long,” Goodman said. “Maybe we are getting hot at the right time. I don’t know what turned it on. Maybe they got tired of hearing me fuss about it. But we’ve got three seniors that have been in the playoffs and know what it’s about. I think a lot of it is those guys stepping up.”

The Hornets improved to 19-7 on the season and will now play St. Patrick in second round Class 2A action. St. Patrick will host the first-round game on Thursday at 6 p.m. while Lake will host Friday’s game two at 6 p.m. The site of the third game will be determined by a coin toss or a neutral site. St. Patrick, 20-10 on the year, is a new school made up of St. John and Mercy Cross on the Coast. St. John is the team that beat Lake 7-6 last year and eliminated them from the playoffs and eventually won the Class 1A state championship.

“They are basically the team that put us out last year,” Goodman said of the St. Patrick team. “They’ve basically got all of their players back from last year and the same coach. I thought we were just as good as they were last year, we just didn’t get it done. We know they are going to be fundamentally sound. We just have to continue to swing the bats and score some runs.”



Lake 15, Enterprise 3

In the first game of the series, the Hornets had to travel to Enterprise only to have the game called due to fog.

With Lake leading 3-2 in the first game, the game moved to Lake and the Hornets showed no mercy on the visitors. After a single run in the third for a 4-2 lead, Lake score four in the fourth, two in the fifth and five in the seventh.

Marcus Ricks had a monster day at the plate as he started the continued contest for the Hornets with a home run.

“I think that really set the tone for us,” Goodman said. “After we got out of the base-loaded jam, Ricks steps up and hits a home run. I’ve been on him all year because he hit seven home runs last year and hasn’t hit one this year. Then he hits three in one game.”

Ricks ended the day with three home runs and drove in seven runs. David Murray continued his hot hitting as he was 3-for-4 with a pair of doubles and two RBIs. Cody Taylor was 2-for-4 with two RBIs and three runs scored. Spencer Cash was 2-for-5 with a double and two RBIs while Colton Mitchell had a pair of singles and two RBIs.

Blake Luke pitched the first portion of the game in Enterprise and Gammage pitched the final 5 1/3 innings in Lake. Gammage allowed just one run on two hits. Luke picked up win and improved to 4-1 on the season.



Lake 11, Enterprise 2

The Hornets got a complete-game performance from Colton Mitchell struck out 12 to help the Hornets advance in the Class 2A playoffs.

Mitchell improved to 5-2 on the season as he gave up two runs on five hits in seven innings while striking out 12 and walking one.

Lake scored one in the first and five in the third to go up 6-0. After two in the fourth, the Hornets added three in the sixth for the final margin.

Mitchell was 2-for-4 at the plate and scored two runs while knocking in a pair of runs. Spencer Cash was 2-for-4 with an RBI while Cody Taylor was 2-for-4 with a double.



Lake 22, Nanih Waiya 2

Don’t blame Nanih Waiya if they don’t mind seeing David Murray come around.

Murray had another monster day against Nanih Waiya as he went 4-for-5 and drove in seven runs with a pair of home runs, including a grand slam. Murray has only hit four home runs this year, all against Nanih Waiya and three of the four have been grand slams.

The Hornets banged out 16 hits in the contest and took advantage of seven Warrior errors. The Hornets scored in every inning with two in the first, three in the second, six in the third and fifth and five in the fourth.

Sam Wooten was 3-for-4 with a double and three RBIs and also scored four runs. Dwayne Gammage was 2-for-4 with a triple and three runs scored while Matthew Bradshaw was 2-for-3.

Blake Luke pitched three innings and picked up the winning, improving to 3-1 on the season. Colton Mitchell and Gammage each pitched an inning of relief.

        

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