By Michael A. Lough

The Sports Report

centralgasports@gmail.com

To be updated with Tattnall-Hebron Christian quotes and more details for the morning edition

         The postgame huddles and fan high-fiving were over, and some groundskeeping work remained.

          But what had just transpired wasn’t soon getting out of anybody’s system.

          “Holy mackerel,” Gray Talton said while jogging to the dugout to grab some field-fixing apparatus. “We got a squad.”

          A few minutes later, Benjamin Stubbs was among teammates raking the dirt around third base.

          “I’m about to have a heart attack,” he said.

          Ah, Trey Ham had it the whole time.

          The standout hitter and catcher from Tattnall was summoned to pitch – and pitch his third inning of the season – in the bottom of the seventh.

          Of a one-run game.

          In the loser-go-home third game of a GHSA Class A-Private semifinal.

          It wasn’t as smooth as the normal Ham at-bat, but it was as effective, the senior standout hitting the first batter with his third pitch, following with an out, a balk and wild pitch, and an out, and coming up with the game-ending strikeout as Tattnall nipped Hebron Christian 8-7 in Game 3 of their series.

          The Trojans advance to play Savannah Christian at Savannah’s Grayson Stadium in the state championship starting Tuesday.

          Tattnall has survived two gut-wrenching three-game playoff series at home to make it to another championship series.

          “It’s good to see us punched, get knocked down, get back up, and start punching,” Tattnall head coach Joey Hiller said. “That’s what his program’s about.”

          They’ve made it tough on themselves by blowing some leads and holding on. This time, they put seven up in the second inning, two coming on a Brooks Gorman single and two on a Hunter Alexander single, both with two outs.

          And there were the Lions in the fourth, scoring with an out but getting the second out on that play. On they went, scoring five two-out runs on three straight walks, a two-run double, an error, and another two-run double.

          Carter Fink’s sac fly made it 8-6 in the fifth, and Hebron Christian got that run back in the bottom of the sixth.

          Fink came on in the fourth after Bo Hatcher, and threw 43 pitches in 2.1 innings.

          On came Ham, owner of eight batters faced this year, all coming in the series-clinching 7-6 win over Strong Rock last week.

          “He’s been working hard at it,” Hiller said. “We prep for these moments. He was ready.”

          Indeed.

          “I told (Hiller) in the fifth inning, if it was a close game, I wanted it in the seventh,” Ham said.  “As soon as we got off the field in the sixth, he came up to me and said, ‘Head to the pen.’ I told him I was about to do it to ‘em.”

          Eventually and suspensefully, he did.

          He popped Thomas Headley on the third pitch, got Jack Ihm out on foul bunts, but pushed courtesy runner Nathan Alexander to second with a balk, a delayed call after Hebron Christian coaches started pointing it out. There were discussions, a conference, discussions, and it was upheld.

          Ham admitted he probably balked, and had no trouble with the call, although head coach Joey Hiller was still a little stunned after the game.

          No problem. Nor was it an issue when a wild pitch three pitches later put Nathan Alexander on third.

          Ham finished the strikeout, and then needed five pitches to sit Luke Starling down and end the Lions’ season at 20-16-1.

It wasn’t complicated.

“I throw fastballs,” he said about his repertoire. “I can throw a breaking ball sometimes.”

          “He’s Trey,” Hiller said. “He’s a senior. You’re going to get the best effort you can get out of seniors.”

          Ham had a quiet night at the plate, the Lions wanting nothing to do with him in issuing three walks, almost a third of their 10 free passes. But Alexander had two hits and two RBI, with Gorman and Fink driving in two runs each for Tattnall, which was outhit 7-5.

          The Trojans improved to 33-3, and 3-1 in one-run games, there of the four coming in the last two series. 

          The Trojans improved to 33-3, and 3-1 in one-run games, there of the four coming in the last two series, which have gone three games, including being shut out at home against Strong Rock and losing the opener to Hebron Christian.

          Hiller said the Trojans have been playing some subpar baseball lately.

          “We haven’t played great Tattnall baseball,” he said. “I don’t think we’ve played six games as poorly as we’ve played our last six games, ever, here. We haven’t been on top of our game.

“Truth is, I don’t think we’ve ever, ever, in 20 years, lost Game 1 of a series and won the series,” Hiller said. “I can’t remember it. … We still got a lot to work on before next week, and hopefully we’re gonna get some good weather and get an opportunity to grind a little bit.”           

Major heartbreak for Bleckley County

          It’ll take a good while for the Royals to get over this one, their first trip to the semifinals since 1996..

          They scored three in the top of the first, but gave them right back in the bottom half, and another four in the second.

          But that 7-3 deficit turned into an 11-7 lead with an eight-run fourth.

          Jeff Davis showed why it’s a regular Final Four visitor, scoring two in the fifth and four in the sixth and holding the Royals’ offense in check when it mattered most for a 13-12 Game-3 win in their GHSA Class AA semifinal series in Cochran.

          Bleckley County had four fewer hits than Jeff Davis, but also four fewer errors, the Yellow Jackets surviving six errors and a whopping eight unearned runs. The Royals gave up three unearned runs on two errors.

          The Royals stranded 10 runners and the Yellow Jackets 12.

          Jeff Davis’s first four batters in the bottom of the sixth reached as the Yellow Jackets chipped away at the 12-9 deficit. An RBI single was followed by an RBI fly, a hit batter, the a game-tying RBI single.

          The lead and winning run came on a fly to right, followed by the third out.

          Brody Little led off Bleckley County’s seventh with a walk, but the Yellow Jackets got two strikeouts before Andrew Thompson singled.

          Reliever Britt Metts got the game-ending groundout four pitches later.

          Little went 4 for 4 with four RBI and two runs, Lane Kitchens having a 3-for-4 game with three runs. Jack Fernandez had two hits, Steven Knighton and Thompson two RBI each.

          The Royals finish 26-14.