Starmount’s Xavier Martin breaks for home while Mountain Island Charter’s Cole Hart and Tanner Leeson converge on Brady Fann’s sacrifice bunt in the fifth inning of last Tuesday’s playoff opener. The score tied the game at five.
BOONVILLE — Mountain Island Charter had plenty at stake in Tuesday evening’s playoff baseball opener — pun intended.
Adam Grant, the Raptors’ head baseball coach, provided a little incentive that if his team won its first round game, he would treat them all to a steak dinner afterwards.
Thanks to a few fortunate bounces late, they earned their steak dinner on the strength an 8-7 win over Starmount.
The No. 19 Raptors also advanced to the second round against Gaston County foe Cherryville. The Ironmen won that game, 4-1 on Thursday.
Mountain Island (7-12) mounted a late-inning comeback after it trailed on two different occasions through five innings.
Down 6-5 heading into the top of the sixth, Caden Easter utilized a little bit of small ball to score Tanner Leeson with a sacrifice bunt to tie the game.
After Ryan Kimmer, Starmount’s starting pitcher, intentionally walked Cole Hart, the junior avoided further damage by inducing a Evan Borman groundout to end the inning.
The Raptors struck again in the top of the seventh as Jake Barber drew a walk to lead off the inning and stole second base.
Starmount reliever Nohr Issa retired the next two Mountain Island batters, but Leeson reached base on an errant throw and the error allowed Barber to score and take the lead.
After Tiger Coffin was hit by a pitch, Jack Osterndorf pushed the lead to 8-6 with an RBI single.
The hit chased Issa, who was credited with the loss, and Darren Shore relieved him and got off to a shaky start when a pitch hit Easter.
But the junior settled down and got Hart to hit into a fielder’s choice to end the inning.
Hart relieved Borman, who threw just 72 pitches through six innings, on the mound and the senior struggled in a potential save situation.
Pinch hitter Bam Royall, Luke Kimmer and Brady Fann drew consecutive walks to load the bases with nobody out.
That prompted Grant to bring in Barber to try and stop the bleeding, but the No. 14 Rams (11-15) cut the Raptors lead to run after Royall scored on Mason Moxley’s fielder’s choice.
The junior catcher was one of three Starmount players (Luke Kimmer and Xavier Martin being the others) to finish with two hits.
Barber buckled down and even overcame a comebacker from Jackson Craver that hit off his glove to force out Luke Kimmer at home. The junior then forced Ryan Kimmer to hit into a game-ending 1-2-3 double play.
Both teams played even early on. Stamount jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first behind RBI base hits from Moxley (double) and Craver (single).
Leonard Hadley, who finished 3-for-4 with four runs batted in, cut the deficit in half in the second with a solo home run. The senior added an RBI single in the third and added a two-run single in the top of the fifth that put the visitors ahead 5-3.
