Pinellas Park’s Postseason Streak Halted by Manatee, 12-6

As the saying goes, all good things must come to an end.

And that’s exactly what happened to Pinellas Park’s stunning postseason run to the Class 5A regional finals on Friday night.

Manatee (22-8) scored five runs in the first inning and at least one run in every inning except for the fourth. Starting pitcher Correlle Prime settled down after allowing a grand slam in the second inning to lead the Hurricanes to the state final four for the first time since 1963.

“This is awesome,” an elated Hurricanes head coach Dwayne Strong said after the win.” It’s been 48 years since (Manatee’s) been there, and it’s a great thing. We made history,” Prime said.

The Patriots (13-15) had been the surprise story of Pinellas County, shaking off a mediocre regular season to take four huge wins in the playoffs, including a district championship victory over rival Largo and a pair of impressive wins over Tarpon Springs and East Lake in the regional.

The leader of the charge was starter Donny Norris, a senior with two complete game victories in the postseason who got the call to start the biggest game of the season on Friday night.

Unfortunately for the Patriots, Norris didn’t have much left in the tank following the exhausting run to the finals. The Hurricanes battered him for a dozen hits and a dozen runs in seven innings, notching five extra base hits and keeping the pressure on by continually adding to its early lead.

“I knew we had a chance from the beginning, but…every streak ends,” Norris said. “Nobody expected us to make it this far, even we didn’t expect us to make it this far.”

Manatee jumped on Norris early when it strung together five hits in the first, the highlight being a two run homer by third baseman Trevor Beeman. 

The Patriots made a game of it when freshman Brandon Grigsby lofted a shot over the center field fence with the bases loaded to bring Pinellas Park within one, 6-5, in the second.

But Prime (7IP, 6R, 4ER, 9H, 3BB, 9K) settled down after that, limiting the Patriots to just five hits and one the rest of the way, striking out nine batters en route to the complete game victory.

“I buckled down from there (after the grand slam),” Prime said. “Coach had a vision that we could do this….and I wanted to do it, I wanted to go to the final four.”

Despite the difficult end to the season, Pinellas Park coach Bill Ruttencutter said his team has nothing to hang its head about.

“This (run) is something they will actually talk about maybe 10 years from now. This is something they can always take with them. It’s a fantastic feeling, they did a great job. They should savor every minute of it.”