Although the preceding professionally-written article hits the highlights, I will still add my recap to the mix. So first of all, congrats to the Gladiators for their first ever state baseball title and considering the way they achieved it (six road trips to all corners of the state over a two-week period) they may never want to play another home game again! This week alone they knocked off three of the state's four regional champs (Rappahannock, Clintwood, and now William Campbell.)
Today's game, for those of you who hadn't noticed, had the same final score (5-0) as yesterday's semi-final win over Clintwood, but this one was a much closer and more intense game. As the article above mentioned, both pitchers did a great job as each team only had four hits on the day.
In fact, in the early going, I would have given the edge to Sligh. He retired the first seven RHS batters that he faced, whereas Bishop was getting the job done, but was needing a few more pitches to do so. Sligh on the other hand probably pitched one of the fastest half-innings in history as it took something like 2 1/2 minutes and maybe five pitches for him to set the Red Pride down in the top of the first.
He again retired the Gladiators 1/2/3 in the second but in the third RHS touched him for their first two runs. The first two batters walked and then the Big Red's ever-so-dependable Cody Swisher lofted the first hit of the game just over the second baseman's glove to score the first run. Then on the very next at-bat, Kyle Wilson hit a sharp but routine grounder to the shortstop, which was bobbled just enough to allow the second run to come in.
From that point on, it was gut-check time over and over for both teams. Each pitcher maintained his control and fans for both sides sat on the edges of their seats waiting for either the Gladiators to score an insurance run or for the Generals to get the break they needed to make it a game.
Through that stretch, neither side of the bleachers was especially pleased with the home plate umpire as frequent grumbling was heard all over the stadium. I personally had trouble understanding his definition of the outside right corner, but at least he seemed to be consistent about it. As the game wore in to the late innings, he even started to acknowledge the heckling and made the occasional gesture to indicate why a certain pitch was a ball instead of a strike.
William Campbell's best chance to score came in the bottom of the sixth when their first two batters scratched for hits. Don't quote me on this, but I think Bishop had a one-hitter going until that point, because they only ended up with four and I think the fourth one came in the bottom of the seventh. But he bore down and retired the side without any scoring. In fact, if my memory serves, WC only reached third base once today and that was back in the bottom of the first.
So the game went to the 7th, still anybody's ball game at 2-0, but the wheels fell off the bus for the Generals as the raucous Gladiator crowd grew louder with each play. I can't remember every single thing that happened but the key parts of the inning were a fly ball to shallow right field that the WC player insisted he caught but the first base umpire ruled a trap, and after a protest and a consultation with the second base umpire the call stood; a nice hit by Bishop that stayed just a foot or two inside the right field line; a passed ball that scored run number three for the Gladiators; and a throwing error at first that plated another run.
When all that damage was done, there seemed to be little hope for a Generals' comeback, but they did start off their final at-bat with a double, the only extra-base hit that either team had all day. But Bishop struck out the next guy and the game ended with a fly to left and a put out at first.
Considering that the Gladiators pitched 14 innings of shutout ball over the two Salem games and only committed one harmless error (yesterday) the credit has to go to their pitching and defense. However, Coach Painter may have actually set the stage for this win back last Friday AT William Campbell when he made the decision to go with his fourth pitcher (Billy Coffin) and a JV player (Colt Miller) in that game. The new rules this year forced his hand on that to a degree, but the bottom line is that the Generals had not seen Bishop until today and once he got into his groove, they just didn't have the answer.
But once again, it is only fair to acknowledge that Sligh pitched a heck of a game in his own right. The Gladiators just got their hits in exactly the right places and the two Generals' errors (three if you count the passed ball) all led directly to runs and that was the story of the game.
Next year RHS returns some strong pitching in Bishop, Whitehead and Miller, but it will be hard to replace several key seniors (Swisher, Clymore, Wolfe, Wilson, to name a few.) But I am sure the Big Red will rise to the occasion and embrace the role of defending state champions!
