SANFORD —The Scotland baseball team fell in the first round of the Sandhills Athletic Conference (SAC) Tournament on the road Monday night at the hands of the Southern Lee Cavaliers in a 2-1 final. The Scots finish the pre state playoffs part of their season at 12-11 overall and 7-6 in conference games with the loss while Southern Lee improves to 15-9 overall and 8-5 against conference opponents with the victory. The Cavaliers took all three matchups against Scotland this season, having also won both regular season games back on March 11 (in Laurinburg) and 14 (in Sanford) in 6-3 and 6-5 finals.
The Scots got their lone run of the game in the top of the fifth inning while Southern Lee got one apiece in the bottom of the seventh and eighth frames. Both teams had four hits in the games while Scotland committed one error to none for the Cavaliers.
Ayden Odom went 1-1 at the plate and had Scotland’s lone RBI while also drawing a walk. Dylan Tilson went 2-3 while Kaden Hunsucker went 1-3 in the batters box.
Garrett Manning pitched 7.2 innings for the Scots, allowing two runs and four hits while striking out seven Southern Lee batters against three walks. He threw 106 pitches (69 strikes) to the 31 batters he faced.
The two semifinals matchups (Southern Lee @ Pinecrest and Lee County @ Richmond) in the SAC Tournament will take place on Tuesday night with the winners meeting in Thursday night’s Championship Game (hosted by the higher seed). The Scots meanwhile will wait until Monday for the state playoff bracket to come out and see if they qualified. Further important dates for the remainder of the baseball season can be found here: Baseball – NCHSAA.