McLean Baseball Season Ends with 4-2 Regional Loss to South County

While McLean’s baseball team showed it has a solid shot at being one of the region’s top teams in 2012, the Highlanders also were out to win a few Northern Region tournament games this year.

Coach John Thomas’ squad nearly pulled off the upset of the year Saturday in Lorton against South County, a team that came into the game 22-0 and ranked No. 1 in the Washington, D.C. area.

After an inauspicious start to the game on Friday night where the Highlanders (14-8) found themselves down 4-0 after just five South County batters had come to bat, lightning flashed and players were called off the field.

The storm turned out to be more electric than wet, but after about 90 minutes, the game umpires decided to suspend action and resume on Saturday afternoon.

When the game resumed, the Stallions (23-0) couldn’t solve McLean’s junior lefty Brock Hunter, who had replaced started Josh Sborz, setting up a dramatic bases-loaded situation in the top of the seventh. But the four runs from Friday night proved to be enough as they held on to win 4-2.

The Stallions had chance to put the game out of reach in the middle innings. They left eight runners on base and were victimized by a pair of baserunning mistakes in the second and fifth innings. McLean catcher Hardy Cox also stifled a rally when he threw out speedy Drew Rector on a steal attempt with one out in the second. South County had runners on second and third with one out in the fifth when Hunter got Cameron Thompson to line out to first and struck out Blake Thompson to end the inning with the bases loaded.

“We hit six balls right on the nose and didn’t have anything to show for ‘em,” said South County coach Mark Luther. “We had opportunities, but they made plays today.  They did a nice job keeping themselves in the game.”

Pitching ruled the day, as South County starter Tyler Frazier cruised through five innings on Saturday, recording 11 strikeouts in the six innings pitched and only running into trouble in the seventh.

On Friday night, McLean coach John Thomas told Hunter he would be on the mound when the game re-started on Saturday.

“I was up all night thinking about what I was going to do,” Hunter said.

“It was the best thing that could have happened to us. We had zero momentum,” said Thomas of the overnight break. “Obviously Josh is a phenomenal pitcher, but the thing we found was that he was throwing the ball 91 miles an hour and they weren’t fooled. He threw 28 pitches and based on what we saw, we thought it would be better to go with a little finesse from the left side.”

 The move paid off for Thomas and the Highlanders, but they couldn’t generate enough offense against Frazier, who recorded strikeouts in all six innings in which he got an out and allowed just five baserunners before the rocky seventh.

That’s when Chase Mills led off the seventh with a double and scored when Brian Ristig followed with a double. Jack Boland walked and Philip Morse’s sacrifice bunt came to a rest on the third base line for an infield hit. The score was 4-2 and the bases were loaded with no outs.

Frazier came off the mound in favor of Evan Beal, who is expected to start for the Stallions in Monday’s regional quarterfinal game against Westfield at Lake Braddock.

Beal induced a line-out to third by outfielder Bruce Beatty on a 3-1 pitch and then struck out Oldenburg and Sborz (after falling behind 2-0) to end the game.

“[Sborz] had a big open stance, and he’s a good hitter,” Beal said after getting his second save of the year. “So I went with two hard sliders that just cut right away from his bat, he couldn’t do anything with them, and then I just broke him off a big old curveball and that’s all she wrote.”

Thomas said he was proud of his team’s effort, but he didn’t easily settle for platitudes when asked whether Saturday’s game was a building block for the team’s future.

“We have some things to feel good about. The lefty (Hunter) is a junior and so is Sborz, so we’ll have a hell of a team next year,” he said. “The fact that we lost 4-2 doesn’t take the sting off of losing. We believed we could win. That’s the kind of team we’ve got.”

“We’re tough, we’re one of the toughest teams in the region,” Hunter said. “We’re always ready to battle, and that’s what we did.”

Thomas said if the Highlanders weren’t going to win, they weren’t going to roll over, either.

“If they’re going to go on to be state champions, this wasn’t going to be part of their cakewalk.”