Hot-hitting Drew Davis capped off Rowan’s three-run rally in the bottom of the ninth inning with a single up the middle that drove in Brian Hatley with the winning run at Newman Park.

Coach Jim DeHart’s Rowan club, now 19-9, had to work hard for its third straight victory in the best-of-five second-round Area III playoff series. Mooresville, with a victory, could have had the home field advantage for Game 4 tonight.

Instead, third-seeded Rowan will host sixth-seeded King in the opening game of the best-of-five quarterfinals at Newman Park at 7:15 p.m. Tuesday. It will be a rematch of the 1998 Area III championships series, won by Rowan in six games.

King advanced by sweeping Wilkes County. King won a doubleheader by scores of 10-2 and 5-3 at home Saturday to take that series.

Rowan, which had won the first two games over Mooresville by 7-2 on Monday and 18-5 on Friday, found itself down 5-3 going into the last of the ninth on Saturday.

That’s when Mooresville coach Whitey Meadows when with his closer, Josh Overcash, to finish up after eight strong innings by starter Jeremy Sherrill.

Daniel Moore, Rowan’s ace left-handed pitcher, got a rare start at first base and was the leadoff batter in the ninth. DeHart said later he thought about pinch-hitting for Moore, who had gone 0-for-3, but decided to keep him in the game in case he was needed to pitch to one or two batters.

Moore then singled to center to open the big ninth inning, and DeHart decided to avoid the chance of Moore getting hurt on the bases. He sent in pinch-runner Bobby Parnell. Cal Hayes Jr. followed with a liner to left, and the runners wound up on second and third after an error by left fielder Brian Brauss.

Parnell came home when Nathan Woodburn was safe on an infield hit behind first base. Woodburn stole second, then Brian Hatley drew a walk to load the bases with no outs. With cleanup hitter Brett Peiffer at the plate, Rowan was in excellent position to at least tie it up.

However, Mooresville’s defense came up with a big play. Peiffer’s grounder to third baseman Chris Mills was turned into a double play as Mills fired to catcher Jared Brewster for the forceout, then Brewster relayed to first baseman Ryan Anthony.

That left Woodburn at third and Hatley at second, and Rowan got a break when Overcash’s wild pitch allowed Woodburn to race home with the trying run. Hatley took third on the play.

Davis, playing in only his third game since dislocating his hip against Watauga County on June 18, was at the plate with the winning run just 90 feet away. Davis, with two strikes on him, responded with the game-winning hit up the middle.

“I felt real confident,” said DeHart. “When we scored on the wild pitch, I really felt like we’d win it then. Drew had been hitting the ball hard. He’s just a good clutch hitter. He’s meant a lot to this team, and we were happy to get him back from his injury. He’s been hot ever since he came back into the lineup.”

Davis went 6-for-13 (.462 batting average) in the Mooresville series after sitting out the final four regular-season games with the injury. He was 5-for-9 (.556) the last two nights with two doubles and four runs batted in.

“I’ve been swinging the bat well and just hit it back up the middle,” said Davis, who made outs on several hard-hit balls the last couple of nights. “I started off kind of slow, but I feel like I’ve got my swing where I want it to be, and I’ve been hitting it good lately. I’ve been working off the (batting) tee a lot. That’s helped me a lot.”

Davis (3-for-5), Nick Lefko (2-for-4) and Woodburn (2-for-5) led the way as Rowan collected 13 hits, giving DeHart’s club 43 hits in the series.

“I think we’ve got a solid team one through nine,” said Davis. “We don’t have many home run hitters, but everybody hits for average. One through nine, everybody can swing the bat.”

DeHart was impressed with Mooresville’s effort in the final game.

“I thought Sherrill pitched a great game. He just kept us offstride a lot. He was throwing pretty well, hitting the corners. They played good infield defense behind him. They turned double plays,” said the Rowan coach.

Michael Sandlin did most of the hitting for Mooresville (14-15), belting a solo homer to center in the third and a two-run shot over the scoreboard in left in the fifth. Clark Benfield and Josh Haire each had two hits.

Coach Whitey Meadows of Mooresville said of Rowan, “They hit the ball and come through when they had to. They deserved to win. It was a good ballgame, and they waited until they had to do it, and they did it.”

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