Baseball defeats Delta

The Oran High School baseball team improved to 4-2 yesterday with a 9-2 win over visiting Delta.

Ty Johnson (3-0) tossed six innings of no-hit ball to pick up the win.  He allowed one unearned run and struck out 11 while walking only one and hitting one. 

Oran struck first,  Johnson was hit by a pitch to start the inning, Kole Simms singled and the ball was misplayed in the outfield.  Johnson who was off on the pitch, scored all the way from first and Simms ended up at third, but he was stranded there as the next three Eagles were retired.

Oran gave up an unearned run in the third.

Johnson, who had struck out the first eight, allowed a walk.  After a stolen base and outfield error allowed that run to cross.  He would retire the next nine he faced and by that time the home team had the game well in hand.

Todd Priggel hit a two-out single in the third and scored on a Simms double.  Simms was retired trying to stretch it into a triple.

Johnson singled to start the fourth, went to second on a wild pitch.  He went to third on Kaden Hargrove's double.  Dane Shands singled to drive in Johnson and move Hargrove to third base.  Shands went to second on defensive indifference.  Hargrove scored and Shands moved up on Dawson Menz's RBI ground out.  Shands scored on Avery Mitchem's ground ball.

After four, the Eagles led 5-1.

Oran plated three more in the fifth. 

This time, Priggel led off with a single, stole second and after Johnson was hit by a pitch again, Hargrove singled scoring Priggel and moving Johnson to second.  After back-to-back walks to Shands and Menz, Mitchem singled to drive in Hargrove.

The Eagles got their final run in the sixth.  Priggel had his third hit of the day, this time a double to lead things off. He went to third on a ground out by Simms.  He would score on a two-out error on a ball hit by Hargrove.

Delta tacked on a run in the seventh off of Priggel.  A lead-off double went to third on a passed ball and scored on a ground out.

Priggel went the final inning in relief.  He allowed an earned run, on one hit and two strikeouts.  He had three hits at the plate.  Hargrove also had three hits.  Both had two runs scored.  Johnson scored three times.  Menz and Mitchem had a pair of RBI apiece.

Coach Joe Bickings said, "It was nice to be able to score runs in every inning other than the first inning.  We were able to put people on and get them in.  I do feel like we left too many runners on because we struck out when we had runners in scoring position.  We still hit the ball fairly well but we have to be aggressive early and not put ourselves in 2 strike counts.  Our pitching was really good yesterday.  Ty threw very well to start the game and Todd came in throwing strikes after not throwing for almost a week.  I felt like our defense let us down a little on the two runs they scored but at the same time, the first run that scored was a 2 out walk to the 9 hole.  That allowed for their lineup to roll over and get to their better hitters.  Teams make you pay for that mistake and Delta did just that.  However, at the end of the day, we were able to check a mark in the win column."

The Eagles will be back in action on Thursday when they travel to take on conference rival East Prairie.  First pitch is scheduled for 4:30pm.