EATON — Eaton’s varsity baseball team picked up a pair of wins over Valley View last week, under very different circumstances. The Eagles dominated the Spartans in game one, but were forced to come from behind in the second game.
The Eagles traveled to Valley View for the first game on Wednesday, April 18. They came away with a 7-0 shutout victory behind the pitching of Brandon Miller. Miller threw six shutout innings to pick up the win. Zac Schmidt pitched the final frame to close it out.
Offensively, Eaton collected 10 hits to go with seven runs. Owen Baumann and Jordan Turner each had two hits, while Schmidt added a double.
“It felt good to get back on the winning side of things,” Eaton coach Patrick Flanagan said. “We got a great outing from Brandon Miller and played a lot better defense. We got back to what makes us successful, which is pitching it and playing defense.”
Eaton followed up with a come-from-behind win over the Spartans on Friday, 6-5. The Eagles fell behind early in this one, but rallied in the sixth and seventh innings to take the win. Chip Parker capped off the seventh inning with a walk-off hit to give Eaton the win.
Ryan Venable had a strong outing on the mound, according to Flanagan, with Travis Pittman coming in to close it out.
“It was a really good win for us. It was great for our morale and hopefully gave us the boost we needed to finish the year strong.”
Alex Almeyda-Roe led the offense with three hits and three RBI. Parker and Jordan Lewis each had two hits. Lewis scored three times and drove in a run.
Eaton lost to Versailles, 4-3, in a non-league game on Saturday.
“I felt like we competed all game, but in the end we just made one too many mistakes and it ended up costing us the game. We made too many errors and you can’t give good teams extra outs.
“I felt that for the most part though, we did compete against a good ball club and we will be better for it going into the last part of our season.”
Eaton (6-5, 6-4 SWBL) was scheduled for a full week of games starting Monday, April 23, at Troy Christian. They were set to stay on the road on Tuesday at National Trail, before playing home games on Wednesday and Friday, against Carlisle and St. Henry. The Eagles will close out the week with a trip to Coldwater on Saturday.
