Ledger Independent – Maysville Online

Royals clinch No. 1 seed in district, region tourney berth

Mason County’s Eli Porter steps on home plate as his teammates meet him after a second inning homerun on Wednesday against Bracken County. (Evan Dennison, The Ledger Independent)

They may have taken their lumps early on in the season, but lately it’s been Mason County laying the lumps on the baseball diamond.

The Royals won their seventh game in their last eight, this one a 6-1 victory over Bracken County on Wednesday night to get to the .500 mark at 12-12 on the season.

The win secures the No. 1 seed for the Royals in the 39th District Tournament and clinches a berth into the 10th Region tournament.

“Proud of the kids. They have hung in there and stayed together,” Royals coach Jason Butler said. “I go back to the Raceland game from way early in the season when we were down 9-2 and fought our way back and from that point I think our kids really believed they could compete against this schedule. Now we’ve won seven of eight and really putting things together and clicking at the right time.”

With St. Patrick not fielding a varsity team this season, it meant the 39th District would have to seed with only three teams in the district. The Royals have taken care of business in their first three district games and with Bracken County and Augusta already having two losses, the Royals get a bye to the district championship game and regardless of that outcome, a seat at the table in the 10th Region Tournament.

They did it behind the arm of Landon Scilley, the sophomore pitching a complete game four-hitter, striking out 11 and the timely hits from the bats, the Royals able to score in every inning up to bat as they collected 10 hits in the district affair.

Scilley’s control was on point from the get-go, walking just two batters and constantly getting ahead in counts, 57 of his 86 pitches going for strikes.

“I knew I was coming in to pitch today so I just tried to prepare myself mentally and physically to get the job done and that’s why I think I was on point so much up there on the mound,” Scilley said. “My curveball was pretty decent, but the game before I knew I was struggling with it, so I’ve kind of been working on it. But it really just came to me tonight and I was able to make it work and get a lot of results out of it.”

Jamison Gifford provided the game’s first run with an RBI single in the first, scoring Cole Horch after a walk and stolen base. It brought Gifford’s RBI total to 19 on the season for the team lead, which was later tied by Eli Porter.

Porter hit his second homerun of the season in the bottom of the second, a solo shot that went out quickly over the left field fence to make it 2-0.

Carson Pugh collected the first of his two RBI on the day in the third on an RBI single to left, scoring Cray Fite who reached on an error.

Pugh, who has been juggled around in the lineup, looks to be comfortable in the sixth spot, notching two hits on the day to go with two RBI.

“Yeah, you know they’re not worried about you in the sixth spot. And then I’ve been putting a lot of work in at home, off the machine, focusing, hitting the ball as hard as you can,” Pugh said. “I’m just worrying about hitting the ball hard. Squaring it up, harder you hit it, harder it is to make a play.”

Josh Hamilton’s homerun in the fourth got the Polar Bears on the board as it cleared the centerfield fence, not an easy feet at Mason County.

“He gave it ride, dead center field too. He’s really come on lately. He struggled early in the season and now he’s hitting better than anybody on the team and I’m so proud of him. He puts the work in and he really loves it,” Polar Bears coach Rob Krift said. “I’m glad that we can at least put him on first base so he can hit because if his bat is not in the lineup, we’d really be struggling right now.”

Hamilton has been the only one to provide run scoring offense for the Polar Bears in their two meetings with the Royals, a two-run homer in the first game their only runs in that one.

A Colin Combess single followed, but Scilley settled down from there to retire seven in a row until the seventh when Hamilton led off with a single.

By that time a Porter sac fly RBI, Pugh sac fly RBI and a Jonathan Jones RBI bunt single helped pile the Royals lead to 6-1.

Scilley continued to groove in the seventh despite allowing three runners to reach base in the inning, but a pickoff, fly ball and strikeout ended the threat, completing the game with 86 pitches.

Pugh and Westin Messer had multi-hit games for the Royals, who look to be a lot more confident at the plate, scoring 75 runs during their 7-1 stretch.

“When we were 5-11, my job was to keep the guys engaged and confident. We’re a good team. The kids know that. It was just we have played a brutal schedule. I would like to think that we probably played one of the hardest schedules in our region. And I think it’s prepared us to see different pitching. The kids have stayed focused at the plate and finally swinging the bats from top to bottom,” Butler said.

While the bats have come alive, the arms have too, allowing just 18 runs in that eight game stretch. The repour with their catcher Carson Pugh is helping and Scilley has taken notice.

“Me and Carson have been together for since sixth grade on down, so we got that got that connection. He knows what I want to throw most of the time, sometimes I shake them off but it’s really not too often that I have to,” Scilley said.

Ross Lucas took the loss for the Polar Bears, going the distance in allowing 10 hits, five earned runs and striking out four.

Quality at-bats continue to hurt the Polar Bears, but on a positive they struck out 16 times in last week’s 8-2 loss to the Royals with just two hits, Wednesday striking out 11 times with four hits.

“We’ve been talking about putting the bat on the ball. We’re getting there. It’s just taken us a lot longer this year than I thought it was going to and having a couple guys out and some guys coming back in, we’re still trying to figure it out. Proud of how we played today,” Krift said.

Wednesday gave clarity as the regular season winds down. While the Royals will have the first round bye, Bracken County will play Augusta in the opening round of the district tournament, a team they just beat 3-2 on Friday and will face again May 14.

“We can’t take Augusta for granted. We saw that last week,” Krift said.

ROYALS 6, POLAR BEARS 1

BRACKEN COUNTY — 000-100-0 — 1-4-2

MASON COUNTY — 111-111-x — 6-10-0

3B — (MC) Messer

HR — (BC) Hamilton (MC) Porter

RBI — (BC) Hamilton (MC) Porter 2, Pugh 2, Gifford, Jones

R — (BC) Hamilton (MC) Porter, Horch, Arrasmith, Fite, Messer 2

WP — Scilley. LP — Lucas.

Records: Bracken County (10-10, 1-2), Mason County (12-12, 3-0)