Victory Christian baseball coach Brent Harris is yearning for his team to deliver a knock-out punch.
Harris believes the Eagles will need such a punch to win the Alabama Christian Educators Association State Tournament, which begins Friday in Montevallo, Ala.
Monday night at Walter Long Field, the Eagles delivered just enough of a punch to deck Lindsey Lane Christian Academy 9-1 in a sub-state playoff game played on the Victory Christian campus.
“We feel like we are the favorites going into the state tournament,” Victory senior outfielder Kaleb Holiness said. “We will have to hit the ball better with runners on base. That is the key to success. We have to do better at that.
“But we do everything else well, so I expect to win the championship.”
Holiness had just listened to his coach hammer home the point about opportune hitting in a post-game speech.
“I think we relaxed a little bit when we got ahead,” Harris said. “We have been a fast-starting team all year.
“In our last regular season game, we had three first-inning runs, even though we lost 5-3. I never worry about how we start. We just have to develop the killer instinct. This game should have ended in five innings.”
Instead, Lindsay Lane capped its first season of baseball competition by extending the contest for seven innings and battling to the end.
The Lions were undone by 11 errors in the field. Offensively, they had no answers for Victory Christian freshman Anthony Sharp, who struck out 15 and allowed two hits.
“We played well until we got the big lead,” Sharp said. “Then, we let down a little bit. I think everybody is excited about the weekend because we pitch it well enough and play pretty good defense. We’ve got a great chance to win the championship.”
Victory scored three first-inning runs thanks to four Lindsay Lane errors.
The lead was extended to 9-0 in the third inning when Holiness hit the first of his two triples in the contest.
Still, the Eagles finished with only seven hits and left seven base runners.
“We couldn’t come up with the big hit and that has been the story all season,” Harris said. “We are getting on base, but up and down the lineup, we aren’t getting the big hit.
“We had the bases loaded and had back-to-back popups. We have to take advantage of those opportunities to keep winning.
Victory Christian (13-6) received multiple hits from Shane Bradford and Holiness. Charlie Price also had a base hit and two RBIs.
Scott was sports editor for The Dispatch.
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