Thursday preps

By Ryan Hanchett
Published in Sports on April 12, 2012 1:48 PM

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Baseball

North Duplin 9, Clinton 3

* CLINTON -- North Duplin successfully defended its Jimmy Raynor Easter Tournament championship with a 9-3 win over Clinton on Wednesday afternoon.

Larry White earned the win on the pitcher's mound with a four-strikeout performance. Mitchell Thigpen earned the save and emerged as the tournament's Most Valuable Player. He amassed a .428 batting average and three RBI over the course of two games.

Thigpen, Konner Brock and James Kornegay each finished with two hits for the Rebels. Ced Kornegay added one hit in the win.

North Duplin (11-2 overall) travels to Spring Creek on Tuesday.

Softball

Southern Nash 10, Rosewood 2

* BAILEY -- Southern Nash broke open a one-run game in the fourth inning and dealt previously-unbeaten Rosewood a 10-2, non-conference loss Wednesday evening.

The Ladybirds, of the Big East 3-A Conference, put together three hits -- a triple, single and bases-clearing home run that snapped the Eagles' 11-0 start with first-year head coach Shay Campbell.

"We were trailing 2-1 (after 31/2 innings) and starting to look as if we were going to generate some excitement among our group," Campbell said.

Southern Nash touched Rosewood right-hander Amanda Beckert for 14 hits.

"I give Southern Nash all the credit," Campbell said. "They came out ready to play ball. I don't think our team was mentally focused from the start. It was apparent during our pre-game warm-ups. I don't if it was the fact that their minds were still on spring break, the lack of quality play during the last week or something else.

"We just did not appear to be focused as we should have been."

Scout Anderson, Megann Tyndall and Callie Thornton had one hit apiece for the Eagles.

Rosewood (11-1 overall) entertains Carolina 1-A Conference archrival Princeton on Tuesday.