COLUMBUS — All Heritage Academy sophomore Jack Tompkins needed was one strike to get out of a two-out fifth inning jam and strand a Hartfield Academy runner in scoring position.
That never came as he served up an RBI single, tying the game at 1-1 before allowing another runner on base right after.
Things took a turn for the worst when Reid Gaston stepped up, a power-hitting lefty that got hold of one, sending a two-run homer well over the left-center field fence.
That three-run fifth proved to be the difference in Thursday night’s home opener for the Patriots, who fell to the Hawks, 3-1.
“It’s a growing pain thing,” head coach Zander Romano said. “He’s a young guy with not a ton of experience that’s being put in a situation against a really talented team and he missed his spot, an 0-2 pitch that doesn’t need to be anywhere near the plate.”
Take that fifth inning out of the equation, and the Patriots (1-1) were cooking up a fantastic performance against Hartfield, led by starter Jack Ketchum.
The Alabama commit came into Thursday’s game on a pitch count, roughly 60 pitches, and that worked perfectly as he threw four shutout innings on the mound, striking out nine and giving up just one hit.
“We came into it trying to get four,” Ketchum said. “We’re trying to stretch out all of these innings. We’re playing really good teams and me and Coach Romano had a talk to try to get four from me. Luckily, my outing ended just at four.”
Unfortunately, immediately following his departure on the mound came the blowup inning that the Patriots were looking to avoid, but Heritage had a plethora of problems to deal with at the plate facing Hawks starter Brady Griffin.
Griffin went toe-to-toe with Ketchum, throwing five innings of one-run, one-hit baseball. Trey Rainey was his lone hit allowed, a leadoff homer in the first inning to get Heritage’s bench fired up, but after him, they didn’t manage a hit until the sixth inning.
“We just had a tough break,” Ketchum said. “They had a big inning. We couldn’t respond. We had chances there in the sixth, but it just happens. It’s the game of baseball.”
One final rally came in that sixth inning as the Pats loaded the bases with two outs, bringing freshman infielder Presley Gaskin to the plate to potentially get a few runs back for Heritage.
Unfortunately, after a tough battle where he worked the count, he hit a liner right to Hartfield’s second baseman, ending the rally and subsequently, the game.
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