Blythewood baseball offense explodes in win over Fort Mill

After the top of the first inning, it looked like it might be another one of those close, down to the wire finishes for Blythewood baseball. By the time the Bengals sent 13 batters to the plate in the bottom half of the inning, things looked drastically different.

Blythewood scored seven runs in the opening frame and that allowed them to cruise to a 13-3 victory in five innings over Fort Mill in an opening contest of the Class 5A Upper State championship bracket.

“I thought we were really locked in and ready to play,” Blythewood coach Banks Faulkner said. “We had a huge dogfight on our hands Monday night, so it was good to have a couple of days to get our feet back underneath us. This group has been really good all year with how well they’ve responded to challenges.”

Blythewood (23-8) will host J.L. Mann, a 6-5 winner over Dorman, on Saturday night at 7 pm in the winner’s bracket contest. Fort Mill and Dorman will play an elimination game.

Faulkner was referencing the district final against Riverside when the Bengals had to rally with four runs in the seventh to come away with a 5-2 win to advance.

This time it was nearly over after the first inning.

Fort Mill (26-3) jumped to a 2-0 lead two batters into the game. Patrick Matthews singled before JT Marr homered to right field. Faulkner made a visit to the mound to calm starting pitcher Landon Lucas down, but he liked what he saw when he got out there.

“In the past, is that would have happened, he would have a tough time bouncing back,” Faulkner said. “I took a visit early and there was any sign of frustration or anything like that. He was poised and got back to work. He did a good job of pitching out of some trouble when he needed too.”

If there was any worry, the Blythewood offense put it rest early.

Two walks and a single loaded the bases. After a strike out, Nate Hinson and Brady Beasley delivered RBI singles to tie it. A wild pitch then scored John Lanier to give the Bengals a lead they wouldn’t relinquish.

Josh Cowan added a sacrifice fly, then an error added another run before Zach Bailes and Lucas, a College of Charleston commitment, capped the seven-run outburst with RBI singles.

Fort Mill ace and UNC Charlotte signee Mikey Tepper never made it out of the first inning.

“That was a good arm over there,” Faulkner said. “We happen to get some good fortunate of balls finding holes and our guys in the middle of the order but some good swings on balls.”

Lanier and Jansen Stokes then did their parts to help end it. Lanier, a Citadel signee, crushed a deep grand slam to right field for his ninth home run of the season and an 11-2 lead.

Fort Mill added a run in the fifth before Stokes ended it by mercy run-rule with a 2-run home run in the bottom of the fifth.

“We have a pretty tough team and we knew we had one of best guys on the mound with a strong lineup behind him,” Lanier said. “We tried to take pitches and get something we could drive.”

W: Landon Lucas. L: Mikey Tepper. Hitters: B – Zach Bailes 2-3; Lucas 2-3; John Lanier 2-2, HR, 4 RBI; Jansen Stokes HR; Brady Beasley 2-3; Michael Gregory 3-3.

This story was originally published May 2, 2019 at 10:41 PM.