The Starr’s Mill Panthers varsity baseball team was one strike away from a sweep of Tift County. Instead, the Blue Devils hit a two run home run in the bottom of the seventh inning of the second game on Wednesday to take a 4-3 win and force a game three at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday.
The Panthers mounted comebacks in both games on Wednesday. Spencer Shelton got the nod in game one and picked up the win. Starr’s Mill was down 3-0 until the bottom of the third inning when Shelton drove in a run with an RBI single. The score remained 3-1 until the bottom of the sixth inning when Matt Norton, pinch hitting for Colin Elias, hit a ball that the Tift County shortstop let go through his legs. Two runs scored on the error and the score remained deadlocked until the bottom of the eighth when Luke Harp drove in the winning run with a single.

Tift County struck first in the second game with a run in the first inning against Bryan Daniels but the Panthers answered in the top of the fourth inning when Shelton drove in two runs with an RBI double and then scored on an RBI double from Harp. Tift added one run in the bottom of the inning but the Panther lead held until the bottom of the seventh. Joey Lewis was pitching his second inning of relief and had two outs with a man on second. With two strikes against him, the Tift player hit a two run walkoff home run, forcing the “if” game.

The winner will face Kell next Tuesday.

In the two games on Wednesday, Harp had five hits and two RBIs, while Shelton had three hits and two RBIs. Lee Jones had two hits in the first game and two runs scored.

In other baseball action on Wednesday, Northgate’s Vikings (23-4) defeated Jones County 2-0 and 6-0. Chad Basma and Will Smith were on the mound for Northgate, pitching the shutouts and the wins. Northgate will host Heritage on Tuesday. The Patriots (26-4) are 16-1 over their last 17 games. Heritage advanced to the state quarterfinals by defeating Alpharetta 5-3 and 5-2 on Wednesday.

East Coweta (21-9) split with the Valdosta Wildcats. Levi Futo got the win in game one with Ben Baugh driving in three of the Indians nine runs. The Indians trailed Valdosta by five runs heading into the final inning but their comeback was stopped short, as East Coweta could only score four in the seventh.

The winner of this series will play at Lassiter next Tuesday.

The Whitewater Wildcats first trip to the state playoffs ended at Greenbrier. The Wildcats trailed the Wolfpack 6-0 before scoring three in a wild seventh inning that featured two walks, a hit by a pitch, two passed balls and two hits. In the second game, Whitewater lost 20-0. Whitewater finished the season with an 18-11 record.

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