On Monday night, Salisbury’s baseball team hit rock bottom with an ugly 19-0 loss to North Stanly, a lower seed, in the first round of the 2A Central Carolina Conference baseball tournament.

Wednesday night, however, the fourth-seeded Hornets redeemed themselves in a special play-in game to determine the CCC’s third state playoff representative. The Hornets fell short, but no one questioned that they showed up for a heartbreaking 4-3 loss to third-seeded East Davidson.

“I know coach (Tom) Sexton wanted to win, but he has to be proud of his team,” said Golden Eagle coach Dan Tricarico, whose team grabbed a state championship a year ago. “Salisbury showed it has a lot of character. Today, those kids really played.”

“We came out focused,” agreed Sexton. “We had a lot of fight and represented Salisbury High with a great effort. Especially the seniors.”

Salisbury dug a 3-0 hole, but ultimately was just one clutch hit away from getting it done. The Hornets left nine runners on base, stranding two in the fourth and fifth innings and leaving the bases full in a frustrating sixth.

East scored the decisive run in the bottom of the fifth when it took advantage of a couple of breaks. First, Bradley Baldwin doubled inches out of the reach of Hornet left fielder Adam Taylor. Then Baldwin scored the game-decider after shortstop Boo Blount’s throw to first on a one-out grounder ticked off the glove of first baseman Barry Medinger and trickled toward the Hornet dugout.

The key to the Hornets’ inspired effort was pitcher Michael Blount, who hadn’t been on the mound since March 28. Blount, usually a catcher, was “sick as a dog” and had gone to bed at 9 o’clock on Tuesday night. Thirty minutes later, his mother was waking him up, first telling him that East Davidson had lost its semifinal game to Ledford forcing a sudden-death game against the Hornets, then breaking the news that he would be pitching.

Sexton had nowhere else to turn. Ace Jimmy Haynes has a “dinged” elbow. No. 2 starter Boo Blount, Michael’s younger brother, had taken one for the team in Monday’s debacle. Emergency hurler Tommy Ludwig had blown out his back.

That’s how the Hornets took the field Wednesday after a lengthy wait for umpires — with a still sickly Blount toeing the rubber, Haynes, who had volunteered to catch, behind the plate, and Ludwig, bad back and all, hobbling out to right field.

“We kind of limped in here today,” sighed Sexton.

But Michael Blount gave the Hornets a chance. The last time he had tried his hand at pitching, he had walked nine North Rowan batters. Yesterday, he issued just three freebies to the Eagles and allowed just four hits.

“Michael was in command out there,” said Sexton. “He was just super.”

Only one ball was hit hard off Blount all day. That was Chris Reddick’s long drive to center in the fourth that was chased down by Jason Wallace.

The Eagles jumped ahead with three runs in the first, with Zach Hames’ two-run bloop double down the right-field line the key blow. That’s when the folks who took in the Hornets’ Monday massacre expected Sexton’s team to fold up like one of those lawn chairs parked beside the bleachers at Lexington’s Holt-Moffitt Field.

They didn’t. Justin Spears singled and scored after a wild pitch and groundouts by Haynes and Ludwig to make it 3-1. Two Eagle errors, Michael Blount’s double — which missed leaving the park by a foot — and Spears’ RBI single tied matters at 3-3 in the fifth.

Down 4-3, the Hornets filled the bases with two outs in the sixth, but Cole Grams rapped the ball to Eagle shortstop Neil Thompson, who charged and made a strong throw to first for the third out.

The seventh was anticlimactic. Haynes dropped in a two-out single, but Ludwig popped up to end the game against Eagle reliever Matt Bryant.

“I won’t say we feel good,” said Michael Blount, “because we lost. But we do feel better than we did two days ago. We would have hated to go out with a 19-0 loss. Monday, we were destroyed.”

So ends a curious 10-10 season for the Hornets, one in which they once stood 8-3 overall and 5-1 in the league and appeared to be a lock for the state playoffs.

Next Tuesday, while East Davidson travels to West Wilkes for a first-round playoff battle, the Hornets will be left to ponder the what-ifs and might-have-beens.