Knight fans 13, fires two-hit shutout as Hornets top Maumelle
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Photos courtesy of Samantha Breeding
LITTLE ROCK — Good morning, good afternoon, good Knight.
Blaine Knight fanned 13 in a two-hit shutout against Maumelle Saturday. (Photo courtesy of Samantha Breeding)
Blaine Knight fired a two-hit shutout, striking out 13 to lead the Bryant Hornets to a 6-0 win over a tough Maumelle Hornets team at UALR’s Curren-Conway Field Saturday afternoon.
The Hornets notched their 20th win in 22 games with the victory, their second of the day, both by shutout.
It came despite the fact that several of the Hornets left early to get ready for the Bryant High School prom Saturday night, as well.
“I thought Blaine Knight competed,” stated Hornets coach Kirk Bock. “I thought we competed offensively. We saw two great arms and we did a good job with them. We just competed. And whenever we had the great migration for prom, those guys just picked up where the other ones left off. We did all right.”
Maumelle’s two tough right-handers were Adam Bahloul, who worked into the sixth, and Tanner Kirby who pitched out of a jam in the sixth and around a lead-off walk in the seventh.
Trevor Ezell pops up after his slide into second as Maumelle second baseman Ty Stricklin takes the late throw. (Photo courtesy of Samantha Breeding)
But it was Knight who dominated. He hit the first batter he faced, Kuron Summons, on a 2-2 pitch. Noting his hurler’s frustration, Bock paid him a visit and the right-hander responded by retiring the next seven in a row, five on strikes.
Maumelle got its first hit when Ty Striklin slapped a double to right-center with one out in the third but Knight made a nice play on a bunt by Summons for the second out and, with Stricklin at third, struck out Ryan Hunter to end the threat.
It was the first of four strikeouts in succession for Knight who hit another batter in the fifth but was unfazed. He fanned the next three and retired another seven straight before Kirby lashed a double in the bottom of the seventh. Jason Hastings made a nice play to get to the ball in the corner and fired into shortstop Jake East who applied a tag as Kirby slid beyond the second-base bag. That ended the game.
The Hornets’ offense was highlighted by a three-RBI day for catcher Trey Breeding. He singled in a run and twice got squeeze bunts down to plate a run each time.
Chase Tucker (Photo courtesy of Samantha Breeding)
Drew Tipton, Dalton Holt and Hastings had two hits each. For Hastings, it was a four-hit day as he cracked two doubles in Saturday morning’s 12-0 win at Pine Bluff.
The Hornets finished that conference tilt in Jefferson County then boarded the bus, ate a sack lunch on the way back to Little Rock and took on Maumelle at 2 p.m.
Knight and Zack Jackson, the winner at Pine Bluff, are the Hornets’ conference starters. They both worked Saturday just to get some innings. Neither pitched last week when the only Hornets’ game was a 25-0 blowout at Little Rock Fair. Bryant doesn’t play again until Thursday, May 1, at home against Sheridan. They travel to Texarkana on Friday.
Bryant wound up playing three games on Saturday, counting a 3-0 win in a junior varsity contest against Maumelle.
“I wanted to play four,” Bock said, referencing a JV game he’d hoped to have gotten in at Pine Bluff but couldn’t. “We really needed one more game today because we still had three more pitchers that didn’t throw, that needed to. But it just didn’t work out that way.”
In the varsity game against Maumelle, Trevor Ezell and Drew Tipton smacked singles on the first two pitches by Bahloul. They worked a double steal and when the pitch got past the Maumelle catcher, Ezell never stopped, scoring all the way from second.
Tipton wound up at third and, after Chase Tucker walked, Breeding bunted in the run to make it 2-0. With Tucker at second, Hastings cracked a single to right to drive him in with the third run.
It stayed 3-0 until the third when Tucker reached on an error and stole second. Breeding lined a single to right to drive him in. On the late throw to the plate, Breeding hustled to second then gave way to Connor Tatum, the courtesy runner for the catcher. Tatum moved up on Hastings’ chop to third then scored on Justin Emmerling’s grounder to short, making it 5-0.
Bryant wrapped up the scoring with a run in the fifth. Tucker beat out an infield hit on a high bouncer to short, moved to second on Bahloul’s balk, took third on a wild pitch and scored on Breeding’s second successful squeeze.
In the sixth, Dale and Tatum drew walked. Bahloul was lifted in favor of Kirby whose first pitch was wild allowing them to advance to second and third. But the right-hander left them stranded by retiring the next three.
