Late-Game Heroics Lead Stone Memorial Over CCHS

Story and Photos by Rusty Ellis

The Stone Memorial Panthers struggled to get on the board at all, but scored six combined runs between the 10th and 11th innings to take down Cumberland County 7-3 on Monday night.

Cumberland County’s Hunter Ostrander got the scoring started in the first inning when his grounded was misplayed and ended up in the outfield, allowing the Jets to take a 1-0 lead early.

It would take the Panthers until the fourth to tie things up, as Ethan Todd knocked an RBI single into left field to knot the score at 1-apiece.

This is where the pitchers duel began, as CCHS’ Ace Hawkins and Stone’s Dylan Whittenburg went back-and-forth with scoreless innings and pitching out of jams.

It wasn’t until deep into extra innings in the 10th when the Panthers would plate two runs to take a 3-1 lead into the bottom half. There, Braden Looper entered the game for Whittenburg, and got Cumberland down to their last strike.

The Jets still had some fight left in them however, as Ryan Dowlen singled to center to bring in two runs to force another inning.

The 11th is where things unraveled a bit for CCHS, as Stone scored four times to push their lead to a commanding 7-3 margin, and Looper closed it out with a 1-2-3 inning in the bottom half to clinch the 7-3 win for Stone Memorial.

Overall, Whittenburg finished with nine innings with three runs (two earned) charged to him and 10 strikeouts for head coach Trent Stokes.

“We had a mindset going in that we were going to control our emotions throughout the game,” Stokes said. “We didn’t want to make the game bigger than it was. It was big for our district, but the rivalry aspect of it, that’s just another team that we’ve got to go to work against.”

Whittenburg’s outing isn’t anything new to Stokes, but what he was most impressed with was his senior’s composure after Cumberland took an early lead.

“We had a couple errors in the first inning and gave up the first run, and he never gets fazed,” Stokes said. “He never blames his teammates, he was turning around and picking them up…it took everything he had to be craft and make pitches and mix it up. To go nine innings and only allow one run was pretty special.”

The at-bats his players put together in the 10th and 11th innings were also a key part of the win, as Stokes says the goal was simply to do whatever it took to get on base and get some runs on the board.

“We knew we had to get the leadoff guys on,” Stokes said. “Multiple times tonight, we took extra bases on them, and that was what it was all about. Getting runners on and putting pressure on a team is usually going to work out for you.”

The two teams will battle at Stone Memorial on Tuesday night.

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