A solid baseball season came to an end for Winston Academy last week.
In the middle of a gauntlet of a Class 5A playoff run, the Patriots ran into a major contender for the title. Just two weeks after playing them in a district series, WA had to go up against the Simpson Academy Cougars and it came away empty.
Simpson’s bats were too strong and the pitching got the job done in a two-game sweep to finish the year for the Patriots.
“The first night I thought we were in the ball game going into the sixth but we missed some opportunities to drive some runs in and they didn’t miss them,” coach Charlie Smith said. “We didn’t have our best stuff and we walked too many batters. We made a couple of defensive mistakes as well and one of the big things that has happened to us this year is when it rains it pours.
“Bryson (Wright) didn’t pitch terribly in game two. We misplayed six flyballs in the outfield and if you catch those it’s 1-0 going into the sixth and the seventh. We just didn’t make the plays.”
The first game between the two teams felt familiar. The Patriots were in it going into the sixth inning trailing just 4-2, but the Cougs ran up three runs in the sixth and another four in the seventh to pull away with an 11-3 victory.
Nine walks from the WA pitching was a killer in the contest as Simpson made the team pay for it. At the plate, Hayze Gregory led the team with a 2-for-3 night with an RBI double. Jonah Hood also had a double and JT McGinnis hit a home run in the loss.
Game two saw the Patriots get to pitch their ace for the first time against Simpson. Smith thought Wright pitched well enough but the misplays in the outfield were crucial. Wright threw 4.1 innings, gave up 10 hits, seven runs and two walks while striking out just one. Reed Yates through the final 1.2 innings, gave up two hits, no runs and no walks.
The offense had a disappointing showing with just five hits and Ben Caperton had two of those.
The year ended with a solid 21-12 record for the Pats and a second round finish. There’s also a lot of promise heading into next year. WA says goodbye to seniors McGinnis, Jett Joiner, Max Fulcher, Trey Williamson and Gregory and their leadership and production will be missed. The team also brings back a lot of production as well.
One thing Smith wants to see is a lot of improvement at the plate and things could be special for WA in 2024 as the team moves down to Class 4A.
“We’re going to be young, but we’ve got to improve on some categories. We’ve got to hit better and we have to cut strikeouts down tremendously. We struck out 7.3 times a game this year and in high school baseball that’s got to be three or less,” Smith said. “Our kids need to look at those numbers. Those are glaring things that stick out. We pitched fairly well other than too many bases on balls. It wasn’t a bad season. Two rounds into the 5A playoffs being the smallest school was a good thing.”
