Benton senior lefthander Sawyer Simmons tossed a two-hitter to help lead the visiting Tigers to a 3-1 defeat of Natchitoches Central in the first game of a three-game Non-Select Division I LHSAA baseball playoff series Thursday evening in front of a huge crowd at Chad Hargis Field.
Simmons didn’t allow a run or hit after the Chiefs (24-10) got both in the first inning to take a 1-0 lead. Alex Dupuy ripped a two-out double to centerfield, Brock Laird walked and Dillon Braxton singled in Dupuy.
Benton (20-15) tied the game in the fourth inning on a Kenner Lauterbach run-scoring single that scored Hudson Brignac.
The Tigers took the lead in the fifth as Cole Weir scored on a Case Jorden single. After advancing to second on a wild pitch, Jorden scored on a fielding error for a 3-1 advantage.
Simmons recorded his 11th strikeout to start the seventh inning before hitting NCHS’s Houston Walker, prompting a pitching change. Thomas Allen came in and walked the first batter he faced, Taylor Jordan, before the Chiefs’ Kyron Payne laid down a sacrifice bunt to put the tying run at second base with Dupuy at the plate. The Chiefs’ senior standout drilled a line drive, but right to Benton leftfielder Weir.
The teams take today off, anticipating heavy rain overnight, and reconvene at Chad Hargis Field Saturday for game two of the series with the Chiefs needing a win to force a game three. First pitch is set for 1 p.m., and the third if-necessary game has a tentative 3:30 start time.
This is the first year that LHSAA Division I, II and III baseball playoffs in the first three rounds are decided by three-game series. Divisions IV and V are still using a single-elimination, one-game-per-round format.
TIGERS DOMINATE BLUE JAYS: In a Select Division IV first-round contest at Cracker Brown Field in east Natchitoches, St. Mary’s left no doubt in a 10-0 victory over visiting St. Edmund’s of Eunice Thursday evening. The Tigers built a 9-run lead and closed out the game on the run rule in the bottom of the sixth.
That advances the 16th-seeded Tigers to a regional round visit to No. 1 Ouachita Christian in Monroe next week. But SMHS hardly looked the part of a 16-seed Thursday evening.
