Quick start carries South Range over J-M

April 23, 2016 at 12:10a.m.

By GARY HOUSTEAU

NORTH JACKSON

South Range sprinted out to a 6-run lead at Jackson-Milton and held on after the Bluejays made a run but fell short as the Raiders came away with a 7-3 non-conference win.

After getting off to a quick start when Ethan Dominguez tripled home a run and then came home one a sacrifice fly in the top of the first inning, South Range stretched the lead to 5-0 in the third when Brandon Youngs tripled in two runs and then came home on a base hit by Jared Bajerski.

Jackson-Milton then put their first run on the board in the bottom of the inning when Zac Lane had an infield single with the bases loaded and closed the lead to 5-1.

Travis Baxter had an RBI single in the top of the fifth for South Range and he came home on an RBI double by Greg Dunham to put the Raiders up 7-1

“We had timely hitting with guys getting on base early on,” said South Range head coach Jim Hanek. “And we had that big two-run triple with I want to say two outs and then another big two-out hit in the (fourth) inning. So we had enough offense and played well defensively. We made the routine plays in the field and those are the things it takes to win ball games.”

But Jackson-Milton made a serious run at the Raiders in the bottom of the fourth as the Bluejays closed the gap to 7-3 and were threatening with runners at second and third when the rally stalled out. Hanek brought in David Marsilo in relief of Kelly Keenan with two outs to avert any further damage.

“Kelly did a nice job for us,” said Hanek about his starter who gave up all three runs on four hits with six walks and four strikeouts before he left the mound.

“The pitch count was getting up there a little bit and he had a couple of walks there so we brought David in and David quieted the rally and pitched well for the remainder of the game.”

The win improves the Raiders mark to 8-7, still 2-1 in tier play, and Keenan got his first win of the campaign.

“This gets us over the .500 mark so it’s big in those regards and we’re playing some good baseball,” Hanek said. “We’re kind of half way through our league play, our tier play, and we have Minerva tomorrow out at their place and that’s setting us up for a tough run to finish out the league. We’ve got Monday-Tuesday against Springfield, our rival, and a date with Crestview later on and our goal is to win our league.”

The loss drops Jackson-Milton to 9-3 over all but they remain perfect in their league tier at 6-0.

“We played well,” said Bluejays head coach Kevin Hogue. “We try to teach our kids that we need to play the better teams and they’re a better team. It’s a good non-conference opponent. We played them 7-3 and we threw a sophomore. So I’m proud of our kids. We just have to keep playing.”