ECBL: New Hope's offensive firepower shows up in regular-season finale

By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on July 2, 2015 1:48 PM

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rcoggins@newsargus.com

New Hope finally grasped the concept of quality at-bats during its doubleheader against East Duplin on a warm, humid Wednesday evening.

Too bad it was the regular-season finale.

The Warriors cranked out 19 hits during their doubleheader sweep of the Panthers, 10-4 and 6-3, in Eastern Carolina Baseball League play. Fourteen batters, scattered among two different lineups, recorded at least one hit apiece on the Eastern Wayne High School baseball diamond.

Ryan Warren led the charge in the opener with a 3-for-3 effort that included a bases-loaded, backside triple that rolled toward the fence in right field in the second inning.

Colby Miller, Jacob Ginn and Jason Mitchell provided two hits apiece and combined for three RBI in the nightcap.

"We've really been focusing on the last two weeks on staying through the ball, hitting the balls in the gap and try not to be so pull conscious and it finally started to click," New Hope head coach Randall Fields said. "We hit a bunch of gap shots, got a lot of extra-base hits. I was pleased with our approaches at the plate, but we still struggle with concentration sometimes, but that's what happens when you play so many younger players.

"But we made a conscious effort on doing our jobs. We had a couple of instances tonight where we took pitches for strikes that our batters saw that the man had a stolen base. He let him steal the base and moved them over on the next swing. We've really gotten better knowing what to do when we're at the plate."

New Hope had three stolen bases in the nightcap.

Right-handers Jay Wiseman and Ethan Quinn each earned a complete-game decision on the bump. Wiseman yielded four earned runs on six hits and four walks, and retired five Panthers on strikeouts.

Quinn permitted three runs (two earned) on seven hits and two walks. He logged three punchouts.

"We did good," Fields said of his young pitchers. "We need to still work on locating first-pitch strikes ... got behind on a couple of batters. We were able to get ground balls to get out of the inning. They helped us out by chasing a couple of bad pitches.

"For the most part, we were able to locate our pitches, throw offspeed strikes (and) that always helps."

The Warriors (12-8 overall) committed just one error in 31 putout chances. Fields played a total of five rising freshman and four rising sophomores during the twinbill sweep.

In game one, Warren's three-RBI triple highlighted a four-run, second-inning outburst. One inning later, Case Kermode and Wiseman each connected on a two-RBI single to put New Hope in command 9-2.

Mitchell (2-for-2), Jacob Ginn (2-for-3) and Wiseman each delivered RBI hits during the first two innings. New Hope led 5-3 after 31/2 innings and got a key insurance run when Ginn doubled off the right-field wall to score Kermode -- Mitchell's courtesy runner -- in the bottom of the fourth inning.