TC will face LSU-Alexandria in the series finale today at noon. Brian Schoenhals
The Tornadoes won the first game 6-2 and the second game 4-1. TC head coach Will Ramos was pleased with the way his team played on Friday.
“I feel very proud today, because we played as a team today,” TC head coach Will Ramos said. “You can get a win by two or three guys hitting the ball well and making plays. Today was a team effort. (James Rodriguez) didn’t have it all today. He didn’t pitch like he normally pitches where he dominates people. He only got five strike outs, he got a lot of ground balls; he got a lot of fly balls. We played good defense behind him and we moved runners when we needed to. We placed some bunts and we manufactured some runs. That is big for us.”
The Tornadoes continued to manufacture runs in their 4-1 win in the second game.
“In the second game Ryan didn’t have it all,” Ramos said. “He pitched four innings and after that grabbed the freshman out of the bullpen in a tough situation and he got the job done. It took a team effort. We made plays when we needed to. We had a guy on third base and second base with no outs. We hit the ground ball to second. We had three sacrifice flies today. Today I feel like a good coach because we played the game the right way and that is what it is all about.”
Chase Benfield got things going from the lead off spot with a single. An infield single by Hector Justo and an error on the pitcher allowed the runners to advance to second and third base.
Bronson Honeycutt’s groundout drove in Benfield to make it 1-0. A sacrifice fly by Ramon Cruz allowed Justo to score from third base to give the Tornadoes a 2-0 lead.
LSU-Alexandria cut TC’s lead in half in the third inning. Hunter Decell hit a two-out single to bring home Tid Hilger from third base to make it 2-1.
Honeycutt helped the Tornadoes increase their lead to 3-1 in the bottom half of the third inning. The Pell City native scored from third base on passed ball by LSU-Alexandria’s Colton Knuckols.
In the fifth inning the Tornadoes only needed one swing of the bat to put the game out of reach. Justo led off the inning with solo bomb that towered over the left field wall to give TC a 4-1.
“He got here because of hitting, but we didn’t know how good he was going to be defensive,” Ramos said. “He was in the outfield and now he plays second base and he is doing a tremendous job. He is a guy that hit in the seven hole, but with (George) Santaigo hurt we moved him to the two hole. I talked to him and told him that he needs to be patient. He showed some power and I am very happy for him.”
LSU-Alexandria had a chance to put runs on the board, but they were unable to get timely hits while runners were in scoring position. The Generals left seven runners on base in the second game.
“That has been something that has plagued us all year,” said LSU-Alexandria head coach Dan Purvis. “Depending on how you look at it a lot people say you can’t dictate when you get your hits as far as hitting with runners in scoring position. We’ve had problems this year getting multiple hits in multiple good things where we get more than that one run here and there.”
The Tornadoes take on LSU-Alexandria in the series finale today at noon.
