Matt Shobe had some of his best stuff on Thursday, so Covenant didn’t need a whole lot of offense. But just the same, the Eagles decided to help him get a complete game victory in five innings as they broke out the sticks in the fourth and fifth inning to pave the way for an 11-1 victory over visiting Fork Union.
“Matt Shobe, as he has all year for us so far, was a great leader for us out there and then Sam Lepage behind the plate is the kind of guy everyone would want providing emotional leadership and did great job catching someone who’s not easy to catch,” said Covenant coach Jeff Burton. “It’s been a good month. We’ve played well and we lost two games that we’d like to have back but to teams that are probably going to play well in their respective VISAA divisions. It’s been a great start to the season and we still have a lot we can work on so that’s good too.”
Until the bottom of the fourth, it was a close battle between the Eagles and Blue Devils. Shobe sat down the first five batters he faced, striking out four of them and only allowed one base runner his first time through the order. On the other hand, FUMA starter Andrew Hill kept the Eagles relatively quiet until the fourth, surenduring just two runs up until that point.
“(Hill) was throwing really well and had a nice breaking ball to keep us off balance,” Burton said. “We played a little small ball early which is something we like to do.”
Covenant drew first blood in the bottom of the second when Donovan Jackson drew a walk. After a sacrifice bunt and a walk to Sam Lepage, Luke Burton came up with a 2-out RBI single. However, Fork Union answered in the top of the third with a pair of 2-out extra base hits. Tyler Simon got the quick rally going with a triple and then in the next at-bat, Adam Hackenberg came up with an RBI double to knot things up at 1-1. To continue to duel, the Eagles returned the favor in the bottom half with Will Moore getting a leadoff walk and then Jacob Haney delivering and RBI double.
From there it was about Shobe on the mound and the Covenant offense. After retiring eight of the first nine batters he faced before FUMA came up with a run in the third, Shobe responded by retiring seven of the next nine batters. He wound up giving up five hits, walking one and striking out seven. Just one Blue Devil reached scoring position after the third.
“I had the two-seam fastball that was acting as a sinker from the side,” Shobe said. “Everytime I threw it down it worked and that’s a good hitting team so they couldn’t put it up (in the air). I threw a lot of those, some over the top curveballs and did that to keep them off balance. I hardly threw the fastball, the straight heater at all. Mostly those two pitches the first time through and then had to get a bit creative after that.”
And of course, the two big rallies sealed the deal for Covenant. The first one which the Eagles batted through the order started with Mason Mitchell’s leadoff bunt single followed by the same thing from Lepage. Then Shobe, Moore Tyler Mahone and Haney responded with four straight RBI hits, a double, triple, single and double, respectively to make it 7-1.
“We barreled a couple of balls early and got them up, but the reality is that in that inning we squared up and hit the ball as hard as we have maybe all year,” Jeff Burton said. “Most good teams figure out how to have quality at-bats early in the inning because you can create action and then guys swing a little more freely when they know they’ve got runners on base.”
In the bottom of the fifth, back-to-back singles from Lepage and Luke Burton started the inning. They were brought home with a 2-run double from Moore. An RBI fielder’s choice from Mahone and RBI single from Haney wrapped up the walk-off run-ruling with the score at 11-1.
“Our biggest thing was not getting ahead in counts, allowing too many guys to get on base, running up the pitch count,” said FUMA coach Rodney Carter. “They hit a lot of extra base hits in the gaps and you can’t do much about that and they set the tone there (in the fourth) and we didn’t show up with the proper recourse to help ourselves after that.”
On the day for Covenant, Moore was 3-for-3 with three RBI and three runs scored. Haney went 3-for-4 with three RBI. Lepage was 2-for-2 with two runs scored. Luke Burton went 2-for-4 with two runs scored.
For FUMA, Simon was 1-for-2 with a triple and run scored. Hackenberg was 1-for-3 with an RBI double. Jacob Grabeel broke up Shobe’s no-hitter in the second inning with a 2-out single and was 1-for-2.
