Airport arrival: Eagles win first baseball state championship
Casey Bradwell isn’t usually at a loss for words.
But the Airport High baseball coach had plenty to take in Saturday night when he glanced on the Eagles’ baseball diamond as fans filtered throughout the infield and outfield.
For the first time in program history, the Airport Eagles are state champions.
The Eagles defeated Seneca, 10-0 (6 innings) to sweep the rain-delayed, best-of-three Class 4A championship series. Airport’s first title comes in its fifth try and first championship appearance since 2018.
“It is special,” Bradwell said. “You know we lost Coach (Kris) Kirkland’s dad earlier in the year and he was one of our biggest fans. We lost LG (long-time equipment manager Lawrence Michael Gardner) who had been here for 30, 40, 50 years. I told our guys we are playing for more than just us.
“Look at this place. It is awesome. … But hopefully it’s not the last one.”
Bradwell, an Airport graduate, is in his fourth year as head coach after taking over for Tim Perry, who left to coach in college and is now an assistant at Winthrop. Bradwell spent 10 years as an assistant under Perry and talked about the ground work the former coach put in the program.
The 2025 series was plagued by rain, with the opening game of the series pushed back a day to Wednesday and Game 2 moved back twice from Thursday to Saturday.
The delays didn’t matter for Airport. The Eagles were ready and put a stamp on a dominant playoff run for the program’s first title.
Airport went 9-0 in the playoffs, scoring 10 or more runs on four different occasions.
The playoff run came after a 4-3 loss to Irmo in the regular-season finale, which Bradwell said helped refocus his guys.
“We had a meeting about how special and how good we could be if we just lock in and do the things that we do,” Bradwell said. “... For whatever reason, three weeks ago, we locked in, got some timely hits and got some things done.”
The Eagles turned to Hunter Epps on the mound. Bradwell said he penciled in the lineup for more than 130 times in his high school career. The senior delivered again.
The right-hander pitched six scoreless innings, allowing four hits and striking out six. He also went 2-for-3 at the plate.
Hunter and Cash Epps and Brice Gillette carried most of the pitching load in the postseason.
“Everybody doubted us this year and we proved everybody wrong,” Hunter Epps said. “I wanted the ball. Me and my brother (Cash) have been doing it. Coach Bradwell gave me the ball, said go all seven innings and that is what I did.”
The Eagles led 2-0 after four innings before exploding for eight runs over the fifth and sixth innings to run-rule the Bobcats.
Justin Sightler had a two-run single in the fifth and Matthew Perry had an RBI single to make it 7-0.
In the sixth, Brice Gillette had an RBI single then Braden Gross had a two-run single to end the game, scoring Gillette and Landon Jeffcoat, who was mobbed by his teammates after crossing the plate as fireworks went off to celebrate the title.
Gross was 3-for-3 with 3 RBIs. Gillette was 2-for-4 and Sightler was 1-for-3 with 2 RBIs.
“I’m never going to forget this moment and I’m going to pass it down to my kids,” Epps said.
This story was originally published May 31, 2025 at 11:17 PM.
