By Kyle Roberts
RUSTON, La. — Sophomore Tyler Roach threw a complete seven innings Wednesday night in a rescheduled home district matchup, leading Ruston High (20-6, 6-0 District 2-5A) to a 5-1 win over the Alexandria Senior High Trojans (11-11, 1-4 District 2-5A).
“Tyler has absolutely just competed his tail off on the mound,” Ruston High head coach Bryan Beck said. “And when you get that kind of start in pitching, you can do a lot of things offensively, or you can be patient. And we were able to do that tonight.”
Roach’s appearance included four strikeouts, while only surrendering one un-earned run on the night.
ASH pitcher Jack Lee and Roach both threw three scoreless innings before the Bearcats finally put three runs on the board in the bottom of the fourth inning.
“Their starter was really good,” Beck said. “He had our number in the first few innings, but our guys never wavered and never panicked. All of a sudden, we had a three-spot on the board in the bottom of the fourth.”
Senior Carter Love would bring the first runner home and singling to the pitcher on a one-out bunt, scoring sophomore John Parker Moak for a 1-0 lead. Two batters later, sophomore Dillion Williams hit a fluke ground-rule, two-RBI double down the right field wall with the bases loaded, which would have been a triple had the ball not gone through the fence.
“Dillion hit a big double down the line with two outs — it should have been a triple, but it ended up squirting through a little hole in the fence in the corner of the ball park and cost us a run,” Beck said.
Williams’ hit brought home both Love and junior Nolan Parnell for the 3-0 lead.
The Bearcats added two more in the bottom of the fifth inning, beginning with Parnell grounding out and scoring senior Peyton Martin from second base. Love would single in the next at-bat to score Moak and put Ruston up 5-0.
ASH answered with one run in the top of the sixth, but it would not be enough as Ruston would get the win and extend the streak to 14 straight games.
Beck gave credit to the middle of the batting order for getting the hits needed to win the game.
“I can’t say enough about those guys,” Beck said of Moak, Parnell, Love and junior catcher Lander Smith. “They accounted for all six hits for us. And Williams came through clutch after an intentional walk to senior Jake Simmons.”
Ruston will continue district play tonight at ASH in what will be the fourth game in four straight games.
“We have to win these kinds of games, and our guys did that. It was a big test for us tonight. Tomorrow will be another tough one — we have to get on a bus to drive down to their place and try to do this again,” Beck said. “But man, our vibe is good. The kids feel really good about what we’ve got going right now, and we’re just going to continue to ride it and play the game the right way. Good things are happening for us.”
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