DEACON JONES INVITATIONAL: Union outlasts Spring Creek

By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on April 22, 2017 11:26 PM

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PRINCETON -- This was not vintage Spring Creek baseball.

In fact, it was - perhaps - the most uncharacteristic and mind-boggling game the Gators played all year.

And the downfall?

Small ball.

Union used the short game to scratch out key runs in the late innings and turned back Spring Creek, 8-7, on day one of the 2017 Deacon Jones Invitational at Princeton HS.

"We acted like we had never seen it (small ball) before. That's stuff that we do and work on it (in practice) on a daily basis. I don't know what's going on there," SC head coach Heath Whitfield said.

"We just did not play well...the bottom line."

Spring Creek (8-8 overall) tumbled into the third-place game for the fifth consecutive year.

The Spartans, who will join the Gators in the newly-realigned East Central 2-A league next season, plated two first-inning runs on consecutive dropped third strikes.

Kevin Grady's second-inning RBI single closed the gap to 2-1.

The Gators vaulted ahead 5-2 in the third via a passed ball, infield error and two key hits - Landon Smothers' bases-loaded infield single and Jensen Barwick's two-RBI knock to center field.

"We got the lead and I thought maybe we'd be all right," Whitfield said.

Nothing doing.

Union retook the lead 6-5 in the fifth.

"We did a lot of things that were uncharacteristic and that cost us the game," said Whitfield, whose team yielded a sac bunt, failed to cover first on an infled hit and issued two free passes in the fifth.

Down 8-5 and to its final three outs, Spring Creek staged a stirring seventh-inning comeback. Matt Dupuy reached on a lead-off error, stole second and third base and hustled home on Casey Whitfield's RBI groundout.

Christian Yarbrough, who walked after Dupuy, scored on a wild pitch.

With two outs and Barwick - who represented the game-tying run at third - stood and helplessly watched as Spartans reliever Warren Gay earned the save with a game-ending strikeout.

"We still could have won the ballgame," Whitfield said.

Smothers ended the day 3-for-3 with an RBI, while Yarbrough batted 2-for-3 with an RBI. The Gators scratched out a total of eight hits.