By Michael Lindsay
The District 7-3A baseball tournament opened Wednesday evening with the #5-seeded Cumberland County Jets earning a 9-7 victory at #4 Livingston Academy.
“I’m glad we were able to finish, but we’ve been preaching all year that we have to do our job with runners in scoring position,” said Cumberland County head coach Tyler Thompson. “Tonight we did, and we needed every one of those.”
Cumberland County jumped out to an 8-0 lead through 3 and 1/2 innings before Livingston battled back with a run in the fourth and 6 runs in the final two innings to pull within two runs at 9-7.
Freshman Eli Glup earned the victory on the mound as he struck out 3 batters and surrendered 1 hit and 2 walks in 4 and 2/3 innings.
“Eli gave us a quality start and kept them out on their front foot,” said Thompson. “Livingston is a scrappy, good-hitting team and he was able to not let their offense get going.”
Titus Ostrander led the Jets at the plate as he went 3-3 with 3 runs scored, 3 RBIs and a stolen base. Jayden Hensley also drove in three Cumberland County runs. Sawyer McBride led Livingston as he went 2-3 with 2 RBIs.
Cumberland County took advantage of a Livingston error in the top of the second as a Rylan Burnett grounder scored Ostrander to give the Jets a 1-0 lead. CCHS tacked on three runs with two outs in the top of the third as an Ostrander single and Hensley double gave their team a 4-o lead through three innings.
The Jets continued their two-out production in the top of the fourth inning as they scored four runs in the frame to take an 8-0 lead.
Livingston got on the board with a run in the bottom of the fourth to trail 8-1. Cumberland County tacked on a run in the top of the sixth via a bases-loaded walk to take a 9-1 advantage.
The Wildcats showed life late in the game as back-t0-back singles from McBride and Ben Threet scored a run each in the bottom of the sixth to cut LA’s deficit to 9-3 entering the seventh.
Livingston’s first five batters in the bottom of the seventh inning reached safely as a bases-loaded walk, a wild pitch and a McBride single cut Livingston’s deficit to 9-6 with no outs and two runners on.
The Jets responded and turned a double-play on the ensuing at-bat, but Livingston scored a run to trail 9-7 with two outs. Cumberland County pitcher Eli Ostrander struck out the final Livingston batter to record the save and seal his team’s 9-7 win.
“Eli is our dude,” said Thompson. “He’s been a leader all year and the guys were confident.”
Up next for Cumberland County in the District 7-3A tournament is a showdown with #1-seeded Upperman on Thursday at 4 p.m. weather permitting. Livingston falls to the losers bracket and will face the loser of White County and Stone Memorial on Friday at 7 p.m.
“Everybody knows what Upperman is,” said Thompson. “We have to do our job offensively, because they’re too good of a team for us to do what we did tonight and only score in a few innings. We have to do our job in every facet and not play sloppy baseball.”
