EDITOR’S
NOTE:
Coverage of Coffee County baseball’s postseason games from this past weekend can be found online at www.
manchestertimes.com, as well as in next week’s print edition.

“Survive and advance” rang true for Coffee County baseball in its Class 4A District 6 tournament opener last Monday evening.

Hosting Warren County, the Red Raiders broke a 1-1 tie in the bottom of the seventh inning to secure a 2-1 win over the Pioneers and keep their season alive. The win followed a close regular- season series between the two teams, with Coffee County narrowly winning the previous two meetings by scores of 2-0 and 6-5, respectively.

“You give Warren County credit. They’re a good baseball team. They won 20 games this year and you don’t win 20 games and not be a good baseball team, but like we’ve talked about all year, (Coffee County) is a gritty group,” Coffee County coach Jerry Pruitt said. “If you let us hang around, if you don’t put us away, we’re gonna find a way to win and that’s exactly what we did tonight.”

Scoreless through the first three innings, Coffee County got it going in the bottom of the fourth when Chase Leonard came to the plate with two outs. Jaxon Pruitt had singled earlier in the inning, but advanced to both second base and third base over the course of Leonard’s at-bat. Leonard got Pruitt home from there, sending a ground ball out to left field for an RBI single.

Warren County answered in the top of the fifth inning when Preston McAbee knocked a fly ball out to right field for a double, bringing home Isaac Smith to tie it up with two outs. The side was retired on the next at-bat, leaving it a 1-1 game.

With both teams still looking for the go-ahead run in the bottom of the seventh, Davis McKenzie came to plate with two outs on the previous two Coffee County at-bats. McKenzie proceeded to connect on a line drive to left field for a single to keep the inning alive. Mc-Kenzie went on to advance to third on a pair of passed balls on the following atbat for Landan Abellana, who went to first on a walk as well.

Up next in the order was Preston Steele, who came to the plate with the winning run waiting on third. After taking a ball and a strike, Steele shot the ball out to left for a line-drive single, bringing McKenzie home for the walk-off victory.

“I’m a little mad at myself, I haven’t been playing the best this game, but when you’ve got a guy like Davis up there and you’ve got guys surrounding you and helping you out that game, I had to do my job,” Steele said of his game-winning RBI. “I’ve got a simple job, but it’s not an easy job at all, so I’ve just gotta go out there and get my guys back and that’s what I did tonight.”

Coffee County finished the game with nine hits, including two each for McKenzie, Pruitt and Leonard. Steele, Boone Floyd and Matt Moore each had one hit.

Steele and Leonard each had one RBI.

McKenzie pitched a complete game, striking out six and holding Warren County to three hits, one run and one walk across all seven innings.

The win improved Coffee County to 19-12 on the season and 5-4 within the district.