Blue Jays grab win over Oilers
By Tom Dodge
Errors and walks usually hurt the team that allows that to happen.
The Eunice Blue Jays took advantage of back-to-back Eunice Oilers miscues to start a two-out rally and grab a 4-1 win over their cross-town rivals.
It was a much-anticipated match-up between the St. Edmund- and Eunice High-based programs as the Blue Jays are in their first season of American Legion competition.
“We were very opportunistic tonight,” Blue Jay (2-3) head coach Tré Brown said after the game. “Austin Young threw a great game against us, we were just able to take advantage of some mishaps in the game.
“I have to give credit to our guys staying in there and doing the best we could and hitting what we could hit and producing runs when we could.”
Oiler pitcher Austin Young had retired eight straight batters including four strikeouts when Blue Jay Taylor Eval reached on a throwing error and Wesley Richard advanced on a passed ball third strike in the top of the third inning.
Eval scored on a wild pitch to give the Blue Jays a 1-0 lead and the rally continued.
Quinn Arnaud and Tyler McGee walked to load the bases and Tyler Rodriguez hit a single to score Richard and Arnaud.
Young regrouped to strike out Trevor Hargroder, but the Blue Jays held a 3-0 advantage when the inning ended.
The Oilers closed the gap to 3-1 in the bottom of the fifth when junior Kendall Sam hit his first home run of his high school career.
The Blue Jays took advantage of another Oiler error in the top of the seventh when Wesley Chachere reached base and then scored on a sacrifice by Wesley Richard for a 4-1 margin of victory.
“Mac did a great job of keeping us off balance,” Oiler (2-3) head coach Danny Soileau said of the Blue Jay pitcher. “Our defense didn’t show up to play as we made three or four errors and that we couldn’t get the timely hits.”
Manuel earned the win for the Blue Jays as he went five innings, striking out six and allowed three hits.
Richard closed out the final two innings on the mound and had only one Oiler batter reach base on an two-out infield Blue Jay error before he sealed the win with a called third strike. Young suffered the loss for the Oilers in spite of a strong performance allowing just three hits with eight strikeouts and two walks.