Southern Wayne-West Craven baseball
By Andrew Stevens
Published in Sports on April 26, 2011 1:47 PM
GREENVILLE -- Southern Wayne had seen enough of Jake Brinson and his changeup for four innings.
The Saints kicked their offense in gear and brought the West Craven starting pitcher's afternoon to an early end with a 15-2 rout in five innings on day two of the Pitt County Spring Invitational on Monday afternoon at Guy Smith Stadium.
Brinson allowed four runs on four hits through the first four innings. The right-hander recorded at least one strikeout in every inning during that stretch.
Southern Wayne scored 11 runs and sent 16 batters to the plate in the fifth inning. Brinson was chased from the ball game before recording an out in the inning.
Taylor Brock ignited the outburst with a two-run home run to left field. Taylor Raynor was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded and Keith Jones' infield RBI single pushed the lead to 8-2. Davis tacked on an RBI single and Wise belted a two-run double.
Brock's sacrifice fly and Cox's two-run double stretched the margin o 14-2. Terran Fields capped the scoring with a fielder's-choice that drove home Tyler Gainey.
Cox (four RBI) and Davis both finished with three hits. Wise contributed two hits and two RBI. Eight different Saints recorded a hit.
"Brinson sat back and threw us a lot of changeups," said Saints' head coach Trae McKee. "He threw it for strikes and it had a lot of movement. He was throwing it in fastball counts. We finally strung together some hits. Timely hitting is our game and it just comes in bunches.
"It just seems like it snowballs into a big inning."
Cody Davis scored on an Eagles' error in the top of the third inning to put Southern Wayne in front 1-0. Kevin Wise later raced home on a passed ball and Ashton Cox delivered a two-run double.
West Craven pulled to within 4-2 in the bottom of the third inning on a run-scoring balk and Justin Taylor's RBI single.
Gainey allowed two earned runs on five hits with five strikeouts and a walk in four innings to pick up the win on the mound. He effectively mixed his changeup and curveball with his fastball to stay ahead of Eagles' hitters.
Jamaar Holmes worked a scoreless fifth inning.
"I thought Tyler's breaking ball was really good," said McKee. "His fastball had some life on it. He missed a couple of spots but for the most part I thought he was pretty solid."
Southern Wayne (14-6 overall) concludes play in the Pitt County Spring Invitational against Wilson Hunt at 4:30 p.m. today at South Central High School.