AIKEN, S.C. – In a tournament
dominated by hitting, the Francis Marion Patriots put on a pitching
exhibition on Sunday night as they defeated North Georgia 4-1 to
win the 2009 PBC Tournament Championship. The tournament title is
the first for Francis Marion after reaching the championship game
twice in their history, including a loss to North Georgia in the
2008 title game.
With the win, the Patriots (36-13-1) earn the Peach Belt’s
automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament next week. North Georgia sees
their season come to a close with a 34-24 reocrd.
The Patriots got on the board first in the bottom of the second as
Keon Graves led off with a single. He then stole second and advance
to third on a throwing error by NGCSU catcher Daniel Pettiti. He
later scored on a sac fly from Tyler Boyd.
FMU added another run in the bottom of third. With two outs, Jared
Barkdoll singled followed by a single from Jacob Wallace and a walk
to Graves. Preston Shuey then sent a roller over to second that
allowed Barkdoll to score on the fielder’s choice. NGCSU
starter James Wiley then ended the inning by getting Josh Biggers
to ground out to second.
FMU starter Josh Edgin carried a no-hitter into the fifth, but
gave up his first run to the Saints following three hits. Logan
Sharrett collected the first single and moved to third on Nicholas
Fryman’s single to center. Edgin rallied with back-to-back
strikeouts but Craig Brisson drove home Sharrett with an RBI single
to right. Edgin then closed out the inning with a strikeout.
The Patriots put up two more runs in the sixth to open up a 4-1
lead. The first run was scored on a pair of bizarre errors. Shuey
led off the inning with a fly ball to deep right that bounced in
and out of the glove of Fryman, the Saint rightfielder. Shuey
motored around second and Fryman attempted to throw him out at
third and committed his second error of the play as the throw got
away, allowing Shuey to circle the bases to score. Boyd later
singled and scored the second run of the inning on Martin
Gordon’s double to left.
The two runs signaled the end of the night for Wiley (L, 1-5), who
left after 5 1/3 and allowing four runs, two earned, on eight hits
with three strikeouts. Nick White pitched 2.2 innings of two-hit
relief for the Saints.
Edgin went seven full for the Patriots , allowing the one run on
three hits with with nine strikeouts. Edgin, who was named to the
All-Tournament team, was lifted to start the eighth for Barrett
Kleinknecht, who set down the side in order in the eighth and
struck out two in the ninth to pick up his third save in the three
tournament games. Kleinknecht was named the tournament MVP.
Barkdoll went 4-for-4 and was the only Patriot to have more than
one hit in the game. Likewise, Sharrett was the only Saint with
more than one hit as he went 2-for-4 with a run scored.
PBC All-Tournament
Team
Jason Coker, UNC Pembroke
Shannon Wilkerson, Augusta State
Tim Rawlings, Augusta State
Craig Brisson, North Georgia
Andre Airich, North Georgia
Chad Sage, North Georgia
Josh Edgin, Francis Marion
Preston Shuey, Francis Marion
Tournament MVP
Barrett Kleinknecht, Francis Marion
Boxscore
NG Head Coach Tom
Cantrell – “First off I want to congratulate Art
Inabinet and Francis Marion for winning the tournament, they played
outstanding throughout the tournament. And tonight was a little
different than the other games in the tournament, it became a bit
of a pitching match up. He (Edgin) was outstanding at locating his
pitches, didn’t walk anybody, we didn’t get a hit until
the 4th inning. He got strike outs when he needed to.”
“James Wiley hadn’t pitched in 6 weeks, he’d
been hurt. I thought he did an outstanding job after
that.”
“We just didn’t bang it around and get hits like we
did in previous games, we scored 12 runs in the first two and only
mustered 1 tonight. We made 4 errors and they made only
one.”
“They (Francis Marion) deserve it, and I’m proud of
our team, the way they came up here and performed. It could have
been easy for them not to do that, but they did everything they
could to get into the championship game.”
FMU Head Coach Art
Inabinet - “North Georgia has a very good team, every
time we play them, we get their best effort. But tonight we had a
few things go our way, and we pitched extremely well. And tonight
we were able to come out on top.”
“About 4 weeks ago, we started playing good baseball, and
we’ve found ways to win games, whether low scoring and a
defensive games, or the high scoring ones.”
“The whole team has matured and improved over the season.
We’ve come a long way from midway in the season.”
FMU Pitcher Josh
Edgin – “I feel like at the beginning of the
season, we weren’t as meshed together, it took a couple games
to get going. But once we got going, the chemistry is still
going.”
Baseball
About the PBC
