PETAL – Whenever Oak Grove and Petal clash in baseball, there are usually fireworks and plenty of excitement.
And there was plenty of both Thursday night when the Panthers and Warriors battled with the Region 3-7A championship on the line. When the smoke had cleared, it was Oak Grove that came away with a 6-5 victory at Panther Field.
OG (20-5 overall) clinched the region title outright at 9-1 in region, while Petal (18-8, 7-3) dropped to the No. 3 spot in the standings behind second-place Brandon.
“Never a dull moment,” said Warrior coach Chris McCardle on the latest installment of one of the Pine Belt’s fiercest rivalries in baseball.
“We battle. We’ve got a good group. Our seniors have been together since ninth grade. They want it, and they play well together.”
The two teams traded haymakers at different points in a game that turned into a see-saw affair, giving a packed house its money’s worth. The Warriors won it with an unearned run in the top of the seventh.
Oak Grove jumped ahead 3-0 in the top of the first inning, but Petal answered in the third with a big three-run home run by junior John Lindsey III to take the lead.
“This was fun,” said Petal coach Jake Mills. “Just an electric atmosphere. It’s my fourth year to be a part of this (rivalry), and it’s lived up to the hype that you hear about when you come down here.
“I’m just proud of the way our guys competed. We get beat on Tuesday, then we come in tonight and they hang a 3-spot on us to start it off. But our guys fought, they competed and they did some good stuff tonight.”
The Warriors wasted little time getting to Panther sophomore left-hander Cooper Giger. Junior E.J. Booth drew a leadoff walk and took third on a double by Kendrell Roberts. Both runners scored on a single into the right-centerfield gap off the bat of junior Mac McDaniel.
McDaniel was forced out at second when senior Eli Wheat beat out the relay on a double-play ball. Senior Maddox Miller walked, and Wheat scored on senior Bryson Chapman’s single into leftfield.
“A young kid in this environment comes out and kind of feels his way into it,” said Mills. “But he got settled in pretty good, and that’s what we expected.”
That he did. After needing 35 pitches to get through the first inning, Giger kept OG scoreless into the sixth, getting inning-ending double plays in the third and fifth innings, and an inning-ending strikeout with a runner at second in the fourth.
That gave the Panthers a chance to measure Oak Grove senior right-hander Gage Thompson. Petal got a run back in the second on a one-out double by senior Jayden Madison and an RBI single by junior Dawson Dykes.
But the big blow came in the third. Sophomore Fischer Howell, batting leadoff, doubled to open the inning and junior Easton Giger walked. Both runners advanced on a groundout to first off the bat of senior Tanner Beliveau.
That brought Lindsey to the plate, the third generation of John Lindseys to terrorize opposing pitchers from the left side. He turned on a 1-1 pitch and sent it rocketing over the rightfield fence to give Petal a 4-3 lead.
“Oh, man, I hung a fastball inside and he demolished it,” said Thompson. “That’s it; that’s all you can say.”
The Panthers were on the brink of breaking the game open following Lindsey’s blast, when they loaded the bases on an error and back-to-back singles. But Thompson stopped the bleeding with a strikeout and a flyout.
And he settled down to retire Petal in order in the fourth then pitched around an error in the fifth to give OG a chance to regain the lead in the top of the sixth.
“Gage gutted it out,” said McCardle. “He didn’t have his best stuff, but he battled and he was a little bit tired. I wanted him to get us through five innings, and he wound up getting a big strikeout in the sixth.”
The Warriors took the lead with two runs in the sixth. The inning started when Chapman drew a walk, signaling an end to Giger’s night on the mound. Junior Caleb Pfaff was hit by a pitch from senior Caleb Dillon out of the bullpen.
Dillon got back-to-back strikeouts, but Booth drew a walk to load the bases. Roberts followed by drilling a 1-2 fastball into rightfield to score two runs.
“The inning before (the fourth), I got ahead of myself, missed a fastball,” said Roberts. “I let it get by me and struck out. Next inning, I came up and I knew I had to do the job. I saw a fastball, sat on it and went the other way with it.”
Petal wasn’t done, though. The Panthers came back with a tying run in the bottom of the inning and threatened to regain the lead.
With one out, junior Jordan Freeman singled to rightfield, took second on a wild pitch and scored on a single by Howell, who stole second and went to third on another wild pitch. But Thompson got a flyball out and an inning-ending strikeout.
Thompson (7-0) finished his night with eight hits allowed, he struck out seven and walked two.
“Honestly, I felt like the change-up was working more at the beginning of the game,” said Thompson. “Then I had to resort to the two-seamer toward the end of the game, because they were hitting the four-seam. But my curveball was definitely my best pitch tonight.”
Oak Grove’s winning rally didn’t come without a bit of controversy. Panther junior right-hander Jackson Collins came on for the seventh and was greeted by a leadoff single by Wheat.
Miller followed by popping a sacrifice bunt to the mound that Petal claimed Collins got his glove under for an out and a double play on the throw to first. But it was ruled that the ball short-hopped into Collins’ glove and Wheat stayed at second.
Wheat took third on a groundout to shortstop, but the Panthers thought they’d gotten out of the inning on a slow grounder to short off the bat of Pfaff, but the throw pulled Lindsey just off the bag at first and the run scored from third.
Senior Stratton Farmer came on to pitch the bottom of the seventh for Oak Grove, and needed just 10 pitches to retire the Panthers in order for the save.
“We just hung in there and put pressure on them to make a play,” said McCardle. “We’ve got good players, and so does Petal. If you don’t have good players you can’t compete at the highest levels.
“Our coaches do a good job with them and they want to play. We’re fortunate and we’re happy.”
Oak Grove has scheduled a tune-up game for noon Friday at home against Florence, but Mills said the Panthers are going to take the weekend to see what their playoff destination is next week and recharge with an eye to maybe seeing the Warriors again in South State.
“If we handle our business, there’s a good chance we’ll both be back at it again, but we don’t want to look ahead,” said Mills. “We just need to rest.
“It’s a good time for the three-day weekend. We’ll go home and rest up, recharge, come in Monday and we’ll either be preparing for Ocean Springs or Gulfport. We’ve got to handle that first, so we’ve got to handle that first.”
Follow @PineBeltSPORTS on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
