Tyler Barfield (12) throws a pitch during the Knights’ home victory over Bluefield on Saturday afternoon at Clark Field. Barfield pitched all nine innings and had eight strikeouts while allowing just five hits and two walks.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
Michael Royston swings at a pitch.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
Josh Zambito (24) stands on first base after drawing a walk in the ninth inning.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
LAURINBURG —After dropping the first two games of a three-game set against the Bluefield Rams, the St. Andrews Knights baseball team was able to salvage the series finale at Clark Field in the second half of a doubleheader on Saturday afternoon, taking the game 1-0 after losing the first Saturday contest 7-3 and Friday’s game 6-1. St. Andrews now stands at 12-9 (5-6 against conference opponents) on the season while Bluefield sits at 11-10 (6-6 in conference games).
Head Coach Andy Fox wasn’t thrilled with how the Knights’ offense looked as a whole over the three-game series. That said, he was happy to manage one win out of the set even if it wasn’t pretty by any means.
“I was disappointed in our offense this weekend,” Fox said. “We didn’t play bad baseball so kudos to Bluefield, they came in here and played us tough, ended up taking the series from us. You’ll take them however you can get them in that last game after dropping the first two.”
The unquestioned star of the contest for St. Andrews was Tyler Barfield. Barfield went the distance for St. Andrews on the mound, pitching nine innings of shutout baseball while allowing just five hits. Barfield had eight strikeouts against just two walks in the game.
Barfield’s performance is especially impressive in the sense that the game was only supposed to be seven innings long but wound up going into extras in order to decide a winner. Barfield boiled down his performance to staying in the moment and focusing on the task at hand.
“It was a good game, one of the most intense games I’ve played in a while,” Barfield said. “I just sat there and didn’t think about how big of a moment it was, just going up there and thinking about the next pitch and adjusting from there.”
Offensively, it was a sloppy contest for both teams as Bluefield left eight runners on base while the Knights left five. The two teams combined for nine hits (five for Bluefield and four for St. Andrews) and five walks drawn (three for the Knights and two for the Rams).
Aiden Wilson and Bryson Bebber each had two hits for St. Andrews as Wilson went 2-4 from the plate while Bebber went 2-3. No other Knight registered a hit.
The Knights were able to get the game winning run in the bottom of the ninth in a traditional get on and get over method. Josh Zambito led off the inning by drawing a four-pitch walk and was then lifted for a pinch runner in Caden Santucci.
Wilson then bunted in an effort to move Santucci over to second, who was able to reach third as the attempted throw to get him out would sail into center field. After Wilson stole second, Jack Carela would be intentionally walked to load the bases with zero outs. Garrett Wolff would then deliver the game winning RBI on a flyout that was deep enough to allow Santucci to score easily.
St. Andrews will head on the road Tuesday afternoon to battle with Morris. First pitch is scheduled for 3 p.m. The Knights will then stay on the road for a three-game series against Milligan over Friday and Saturday (doubleheader).
This was the first series St. Andrews has lost since getting swept by Reinhardt over Feb. 22-23 as they beat Carolina twice and took two of three from both Truett McConnell and Spartanburg Methodist. Fox’s focus moving forward is to get more runs across and turn the page quickly as the Knights still have a lot of games left to be played.
“We just have to get on track offensively,” Fox said. “We’re better than what we’ve been putting out, especially this weekend. It’s one week at a time and it keeps on going.”