Drury Walks Off with Extra-Inning Win over Mount Everett
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. -- The Mount Everett baseball team Thursday scored the game's first run without putting the bat on the ball.
Drury scored the last run without doing so either.
For the Blue Devils, it was the deciding run in a 5-4, eight-inning win at Doubleday Field.
Lucas Hamilton scored from third on a wild pitch with one out to complete a comeback win for Drury.
Hamilton started the game-winning rally with a double off the wall to lead off the eighth.
He then went to third when Jake McAllister laid down a sacrifice bunt, setting the stage for Hamilton's scamper home.
Think Drury coach Rob Jutras was glad to see a successful sac bunt factor into the winning run?
"Absolutely," he said. "And I think that was kind of the theme of the day. I wasn't super happy with the way we executed throughout the game and especially early on.
"But, you know, it's one of those things where we work on it really hard, and I have faith in our guys to do everything. And they have to be able to do everything. So it's not just a roll of the dice. We trust our guys and let them go do it."
Connor Hinkell went 2-for-3 with a double and a two-run home run for the Blue Devils, who trailed, 3-0, going to the bottom of the fifth and 4-2 midway through the seventh.
The Eagles used three walks and a pitch to the badckstop in the second inning to take a 1-0 lead on Drury's Carson Rylander.
They then scored two unearned runs in the top of the fifth when Jacob Kreis singled up the middle to drive in a pair of runs and make it 3-0.
Other than that, Rylander was solid for the Blue Devils, striking out 16 and allowing just two hits in six innings of work.
"Carson was terrific today," Jutras said. "We knew he was going to come out and have a strong outing. He's been working so, so hard.
"So for him to come out and give us a pretty good start that got us well into the game and gave us a shot. And he kept the ball out of play. We're stoked about how Carson's pitching right now."
For Mount Everett, starter Matt Lowe also had a strong outing.
He went five full innings, allowing one earned run on three hits and striking out five.
The only damage came in the fifth.
Rylander led off with a double and came home when Hinkell doubled to make it 3-1. An error then allowed Hinkell to score before Lowe got the last two batters he faced looking at called third strikes.
Mount Everett got one run back in the top of the seventh to stretch its lead to 4-2. Michael Ullrich reached on a two-out walk, moved up on a wild pitch, stole second and scored on another ball that eluded the catcher.
Drury struck back in a big way in the bottom of the seventh to keep the game alive.
First, Rylander reached on an outfield error, and then Hinkell hammered a pitch over the wall in left field to tie the game.
Kreis, who took over for Lowe in the sixth, stopped the bleeding, ending the inning with a pair of strikeouts to force extra innings.
Mount Everett had a chance to go back ahead in the top of the eighth.
Brodie Kinna led off with a double to right and went to third on Darius Taliafaro's sac bunt. Lowe then walked and moved to second on defensive indifference to give the Eagles two runners in scoring position with one out.
But Noah Arnold, Drury's third pitcher of the day, retired the next two batters on called third strikes to get the Blue Devils back in the dugout and set the stage for the winning rally.
"It was a great ballgame," Mount Everett coach Dan Lanoue said. "Rylander was pitching a gem. We scraped some runs together. Matt [Lowe] kind of ran out of steam there.
"It's our third game this week. No excuses, but ... It was a great game. We just didn't come out on top."
Mount Everett (5-4) plays its fourth game in four days when Franklin Tech visits Sheffield on Friday.
Drury (8-3) hosts Monument Mountain on Saturday.