Upper State bracket play occurred in Pelion for the first time in well over a decade. Unfortunately for the Pelion Panthers, Mid-Carolina came ready to play as the Panthers fell 10-0 in five innings.

“We thought we could get here and the kids believed,” Panther head coach Barry Fogle said after the game. “We didn’t play well tonight, but you got to give credit to these guys that came out swinging it and it just snowballed after that.”

Mid-Carolina, indeed, came out swinging and played opportunistic baseball as they jumped on a few costly mistakes early on to set the tone.

Jabari Flemon opened the game with a base hit, Blair Moore and Michael Lindler drew walks and Hayden Lake cleared the bases with a three-run double. 

Pelion got lead-off man Noah Pegues on, but he was thrown out at second after Jaiden Myers’ pop fly landed in shallow center, allowing an easy throw to second for the out. The Panthers exited the first without a run and Myers was stranded on base.

Mid-Carolina kept taking advantage of mistakes in the second inning. They got the lead-off hitter on with a single and after a walk and a hit batter, the bases were loaded with no outs. Moore was hit by the next pitch to score the fourth run. A ground ball single to left field scored two more runners and gave Mid-Carolina the 6-0 lead that they took to the third inning. 

Coach Fogle believes that nerves and tightness might have played into the shaky start.

“Being in this position that we haven’t been in in awhile, I’m sure some of them were a little tight,” he said. “I thought we were ready to play, but maybe we’ll come out loose Saturday.”

Over the course of the next three innings, Mid-Carolina compiled four more runs and run-ruled Pelion after five innings by a score of 10-0. The Panthers struggled in the field and on the mound, committing three errors, hit three batters and walked four.

The loss moves Pelion into the losers bracket where they will face Strom Thurmond on  Saturday. 

Before leaving the field, Coach Fogle gave his team a message heading into Saturday’s do-or-die contest.

“Just play hard, have fun, make plays and do what we did the last few weeks to get us to this spot,” he said. 

Pegues and Dodge Keaton provided some silver linings for the Panthers as they both collected hits against a great pitching performance from Mid-Carolina pitcher Jacob Clark.