he Stone County varsity baseball team will not advance to the 2023 Semifinals after Purvis High School won both games in the third round of the 4A playoffs last week.
The loss ends the post-season play for the Tomcats, who earned another District Championship this spring, finishing 16-11 overall.
“It got ugly,” head coach Sean Miller said.
He said the team missed some opportunities and suffered from errors.
He thinks it was due to some young talent with room to grow.
“A lot of guys playing had never been in that situation before,” Miller said.
Still, Stone tried their best against Purvis.
At home on May 9, Stone collected six runs and 11 hits but came up four runs short of victory in Game 1.
S.T. Maust and Daylon Collins collected two runs each, with Willie Breland and Braxton Jones each garnering one run.
K.J. Galloway, Connor Tice, and Maust had two hits each for the game. Owen Spooner, Jones, Breland, and the Collins brothers also collected hits.
Stone needed to win Game 2 on Friday, May 12, to trigger a Game 3 on Monday, but it did not pan out.
The Tomcats earned two runs and four hits in Game 2 at Purvis.
Purvis got up by four in the first inning and stacked up 14 runs with Stone at zero by the bottom of the third.
With Purvis on the mound at the top of the fifth, Chasden Collins walked to first after ball four was called.
Maust and Daylon Collins hit singles in the next plays, letting Chasden Collins advance to third with Maust and Daylon Collins on first and second.
Willie Breland was hit while at bat, and Chasden Collins scored.
Maust scored on the next play, making the final score for Stone: 2-14.
Coach Miller believes this season was a learning experience.
He is looking forward to playing 5A teams next spring.
“This should help us for next year,” he said. “We should compete for the District 5 title and get to South State if we play well and everyone is healthy.”
