Sports

Seminole baseball wins do-or-die game, sub-region

• Seminole County’s Jonathan Buczek shuts down Baconton Charter in a game to decide the regular-season 1-WA champ and No. 1 seed in the playoffs.

Danny Aller

CAIRO — Playing on a neutral field in a five-inning, tiebreak game to decide the Region 1-WA title Monday, the Seminole County baseball team won its rubber match with Baconton Charter, 5-1, to claim its first sub-region title under seven-year coach Truett Johnson. The two teams beat each other during the regular season, leaving Monday’s tiebreaker to decide whether the Blazers could repeat as region champs.

“We came in with confidence that we’d done it before, we just needed to do it again,” said Johnson, whose team now awaits the shaking-out of Region 1-WE, which contains a three-way tie between Atkinson County, Lanier and Bacon to see which program the Indians will face in Round 2 Saturday now that their first-round bye has been secured. “I knew if we could get some early runs off (Baconton starter Tyler Pinson), we’d be in good shape.”

Seminole’s winning pitcher was Jonathan Buczek, who tossed a complete game. Pinson, who was rocked in the first meeting for seven runs in the early innings, but rebounded to lead the Blazers to a win in Game 2, was solid Monday until the top of the fourth inning with the Indians leading, 2-1.

But That’s when Seminole piled on three runs to go ahead, 5-1, and never look back.

The charge was led by Jaquan Johnson and Colin Chandler, who both reached base in the fourth. The runners moved up on a passed ball and then a throw by Pinson into the dirt that allowed Johnson to come home and Seminole to grab a 3-1 lead. After retrieving the ball, the Blazers’ catcher threw a wild toss to first base which allowed Chandler to score and make it 4-1. The Indians scored their final run of the innings when Santez Richardson walked, stole second and then advanced to third on another errant Pinson pitch. That set the stage for Grant Zachary to belt a single and bring Richardson home.

“I’m real proud of my guys,” Johnson said. “Especially the pitching performance by Jonathan — he stayed ahead of their batters all game and gave up just four hits.”

For Baconton, however, the season is not over. The Blazers will draw the No. 2 seed in the region in front of Miller County and also will play one of the three aforementioned teams from 1W-E.

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