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BRISTOL, Tenn. – Every ball put in play was an adventure on an afternoon when the wind only seemed to blow harder as the game went along.
Braden Wilhoit worked two innings of scoreless baseball and Brayden Blevins powered a three-run home run to key a seven-run fifth, leading Tennessee High to a 15-5 five-inning victory over Oak Ridge on a sunny, cold and extremely gusty Saturday at Tod Houston Memorial Field.
“It was hard to see, the wind was blowing right in my face so I had to take my time really,” said Wilhoit, who pitched the final two innings, while also providing two singles, two RBIs and two runs. “It was blowing everywhere. They made a bunch of errors that cost them and we made a few.”
Tennessee High (6-1), which has won six straight, completed a four-win week in which the Vikings scored 55 runs, including a pair of Upper Lakes Conference victories over tradition-rich Unicoi County.
“We are hitting the ball good, we are starting to come along on the offense and our defense has always been pretty good,” Blevins said. “If we hit the ball we will be good.”
Oak Ridge (4-5), which lost to Dobyns-Bennett, Daniel Boone and the Vikings over a three-day span, trailed just 6-5 after three long innings extended by numerous wind-blown hits, errors and pitches affected by the elements.
“It is not easy to throw strikes in these conditions. That wind is blowing right in his chest at 30 miles an hour,” said Tennessee High head coach Preston Roberts, who got three innings in a win by starter Jared Graham. “I was really proud of them.
“We can sit and talk and make excuses about the wind and the balls moving and it is hard to gain our balance and all that, but really both teams are playing in these conditions and you have just got to try to do the little things right.”
Wilhoit was able to incorporate his sidearm motion over the two innings to limit the wind, allowing just two hits and striking out four to pick up the save.
“I was just trying to mix up my speed and keep them off-balance and make them get themselves out,” he said.
It slowed down the Wildcats, who scored five runs in the opening three frames, keyed by a two-run single from losing pitcher Truitt Thuecks and a two-run double by Bryce Ludwikowski.
“Wilhoit is an athlete, we play him all over the field,” Roberts said. “I knew going out he will be able to throw strikes, pound the zone. He has been in those moments and really kind of changed a little bit of the momentum of the game right there. It was really good.”
Tennessee High took control in the fourth, scoring three runs, highlighted by a double from Andrew Dingus, and added seven runs to end it in the fifth, with Blevins providing the big blow with a three-run home run over the center field fence.
“I haven’t been hitting too good all season,” Blevins said, “but I just kept on swinging and finally found the barrel.”
Logan Quales, who joined Blevins with three hits and three RBIs, ended the game with a two-run single to right in the fifth. Garrett Embree reached base three times and also had a run-scoring sacrifice fly while also battling the wind as the catcher behind the plate for Graham and Wilhoit.
The Vikings finished with nine hits, 11 stolen bases and just one error in adverse conditions.
“I just love the way we compete,” Wilhoit said. “Even if it is close we know we have chances to blow them out still.”
“We have been playing with some pretty good confidence,” added Roberts. “This is a veteran team, they have been in the fires before, they know what the expectations are here.”
Oak Ridge was hampered by five errors, eight walks, six wild pitches, two passed balls and two hits-batsmen, but coach Travis Free feels like the Wildcats will be better when it counts most.
“When you have got a bunch of high school kids that have stayed in a hotel for two nights on the road and a tough environment with three very quality baseball teams and then the wind is blowing 40 miles an hour in your face the entire game it feels like you have played 17 games this week,” said Free, who was a college roommate of Roberts at Brevard College. “It has been physically taxing on us, but we are trying to get better for May, we are not trying to get better for March.
“Hopefully these games we can remember and learn some things from them and move forward.”
Tennessee High, which has dropped in classification from 4A to 3A, returns to Upper Lakes Conference action next week, hosting Elizabethton on Monday.
“It is just a really good baseball conference, it is kind of neat,” said Roberts, whose Vikings have left the Big 5, which featured Dobyns-Bennett and Science Hill, two of the largest schools in Tennessee. “Just from kind of watching basketball season and how that played out, it is a pretty competitive conference up and down.
“I feel like anybody can sort of get hot and win the conference that we are in now so it is kind of neat.”
bwoodson@bristolnews.com | Twitter: BHCWoodson | (276) 645-2543
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