The Rowan County American Legion team’s summer plans took an unexpected detour on Monday night.
Seems Rowan’s now headed up I-85 instead of out Highway 64, because underdog Burlington-Graham (20-13) completed a comeback for the ages, pulling out its surreal series with Eastern Randolph (20-8) four games to three.
Rowan (28-3) now has to refocus, because in all honesty, Rowan coaches and players had started gearing up to face Eastern Randolph’s mighty bats — aluminum which banged out five homers and 14 runs in a regular-season visit to Newman Park — shortly after the last out of Rowan’s second-round series with Mocksville.
You couldn’t fault ’em. It certainly seemed like the sensible thing to do, especially after ER scored 25 runs in last Friday’s Game 4 to bury Burlington three games to one.
It was easy for Rowan to get excited about ER. After all, this was the team that eliminated Rowan in a stunning four-game sweep two years ago. ER still had all-state studs Mickey Burgess and James Lowe from that 1999 team. Rowan still had Cal Hayes Jr., Nick Lefko, Julian Sides, Phillip Goodman and Shawn Trosper.
At any rate, the ER-Burlington series was supposed to end for sure on Saturday when Burlington traveled to Ramseur. By all laws of probability it should have. But down three runs in the ninth inning, Burlington staved off match point with an amazing five-run rally.
Sunday, back at Graham Middle School where Burlington plays its home games, Burlington fell behind 5-0 and “Taps” was playing again. Burlington turned a deaf ear and rallied to win 10-5.
Monday brought still more Burlington road rage. Burlington led 5-3 only to see ER’s Lowe, who hit four homers in Game 4, smack one out in the eighth with a teammate aboard to tie the game at 5.
Burlington wasn’t daunted. Listen to third baseman Brad Curtis’ words to the Burlington Times-News following Lowe’s homer. “We got together and said, ‘Look, we worked too hard to stretch this to Game 7 to have everything end now. Let’s go out and do it.’ ”
Burlington went out and did it. It won 6-5 in the ninth, on of all things, an error by ER’s UNC-bound shortstop Burgess.
“An error by our best defensive player who hasn’t made an error all year,” a sighing ER coach Harold Kivett told the BTN. “Sometimes, it’s just the luck of the draw.”
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Burlington doesn’t have the big names or the scary reputation of ER, but hopefully Rowan’s players started respecting their unexpected opponent sometime this morning, as soon as the surprising news trickled in from Ramseur. Rowan’s coaches have probably spent most of the day telling their guys to forget about that relatively easy 14-4 early-season win over Burlington at Newman.
After all, Burlington is a 20-win team, a team with enough pitching to hold ER to 18 runs the last three nights (that’s sort of like walking through Jurassic Park without being eaten) and a team that has all the intangible heart and guts stuff that you could ever want going for it.
Want heart? Burlington pitcher Brandon Storey, bombed for eight first-inning runs in Game 4, came back to fan eight batters in a middle relief stint that turned around Game 7.
This third-seeded team from the Northern Division has already come back from the dead, not just once, but three times, so no one can blame these guys if they’ve started believing they’re a team of destiny.
“We beat a real great team (ER),” Burlington coach Todd Wirt told the BTN. “Beating them, you’ve got to believe we have a chance to do great things. We don’t have any days off , but the way we’re rolling right now we just want to keep playing.”
It’s in that frame of mind that Burlington, exhausted, with its pitching staff frayed but its confidence sky-high, arrives at Newmantonight for Game 1 of a best-of-7 series that will determine one of Area III’s two qualifiers for the state tournament.
The South Rowan-Asheboro series, which opens tonight at Asheboro’s McCrary Park, will determine the other.
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As always, Rowan will have a head start on any opponent because of its amazing leadoff man Hayes.
When Hayes scores his fourth run of this series, he will have scored more runs than anyone in Rowan’s long and illustrious history. Hayes, of course, still has one full Legion season ahead of him, besides what’s left of the current campaign. The existing career record (188 runs) is held by Kirk Huffman.
Hayes is batting .460 this season and now stands an even .400 for his spectacular career. His next hit will tie him with David Trexler (184 hits) for fifth on Rowan’s all-time hit parade. Hayes has hit safely in 28 of the 30 games he’s played this summer and has scored at least one run 27 times. He’s scored two or more runs 20 times.
While Hayes is the crouching tiger at the top of Rowan’s lineup, Lefko has become the hidden dragon in the bottom half. Lefko went 9-for-20 in the Mocksville series with a team-high nine RBIs. Other hot Rowan hitters in the Mocksville series were Spencer Steedley (7-for-15) and Jimbo Davis (2 homers, 6 RBIs).
Hitters looking to break out after a tough recent stretch are catcher Drew Davis (1-for-20), first baseman Shawn Trosper (2-for-15) and third baseman Bobby Parnell (0-for-14). Rowan coach Jim Gantt would also like to see his running game get back into high gear. Mocksville did a nice job of stopping Rowan’s antics on the bases.
Lefty Julian Sides (4-0, 2.70 ERA) is the expected Game 1 starter for Rowan and will be followed in some order over the next three games by lefty Spencer Steedley (5-2, 3.62) and right-handers Brandon Doby (6-1. 4.67) and Phillip Goodman (3-0, 1.86).
Interestingly, three Rowan youngsters, Tyler Morgan, Daniel Cauble and Jacob Cooper (a trio that’s combined to go 10-0 while eating up 65 innings), did all the hurling on Burlington’s last trip to town.
Burlington pitchers Storey and Brandon Perry, last night’s mound heroes, were socked for 14 runs and 15 hits by Rowan in that earlier game, which ended via the 10-run rule in the bottom of the eighth. Ben Hampton led Rowan in that one with a homer and four RBIs.
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Contact Mike London at 704-797-4259 or mlondon@salisburypost.com
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