SANFORD — Unable to complete an early-season sweep Friday, the Richmond Senior High School baseball team suffered its first loss of the spring.
Trying to remain undefeated in Sandhills Athletic Conference play, defensive woes hindered the Raiders in an 8-2 loss to Southern Lee High School.
Head coach Eric Brown noted that despite a strong start from junior hurler Jeremiah Ritter, the Raiders came apart in the later innings.
“Ritter was really good on the mound for us tonight,” Brown explained, “but we couldn’t make plays behind him on defense. We didn’t execute well. It was just a bad night for us.”
Ritter made his first start of the campaign and tossed 4.1 innings. He allowed five runs (two earned) on six hits, two walks and struck out seven batters.
Sophomore Caden Nolan threw the final 1.2 innings of relief. He gave up three unearned runs on a pair of walks and punched out three batters.
Richmond plated its first run in the top of the first inning. Sophomore catcher Evan Hodges roped a one-out single to left field and was replaced by senior courtesy runner Marquan Martin.
A passed ball moved Martin up 90 feet and a groundout to the shortstop put him on third. A wild pitch from Cooper Harrington (6.1 innings, two runs, eight hits, three walks) gave Martin time to race home and make it 1-0.
The Cavaliers (2-4, 1-1 SAC) tied the game in the home half of the first following the first of four errors committed by the Raiders.
In the bottom of the third, Southern Lee took a 2-1 advantage after an error put a runner on and an RBI double drove him home.
Richmond answered in the top of the fifth inning to tie it up, but it would be its final run of the game.
Junior Landon Taylor reached safely to leadoff the inning on an error, and with one out, Taylor trotted home on an RBI single from senior James Eason.
Three runs in the bottom of the fifth for Southern Lee were followed by three more runs in the home half of the sixth.
Hodges led the team with a three-hit night, all singles. Nolan had a pair of base knocks and rounding out Richmond’s nine hits were singles from Eason, Ritter, senior Isaac Hinshaw and junior Riley Brown.
“We faced a pretty good arm and had him on the ropes early,” Brown said of Harrington. “But he got better as the game went on.
“Now we have to get ready for next week with Pinecrest,” he closed. “We’ve got to try our best to win those games.”
The Raiders (3-1, 2-1 SAC) have a big two-game conference series next week with Pinecrest High School (4-0, 0-0 SAC). Playing Tuesday at home, the Raiders and Patriots will start at 7 p.m.
JV Raiders drop second straight to start season
For the second time in as many tries this season, the Richmond junior varsity baseball team wasn’t able to break into the win column.
Playing at Southern Lee Friday, the JV Raiders suffered a 17-4 loss to the JV Cavaliers in five innings.
Richmond tallied solo runs in the first and third innings and added its final two runs in the top of the fourth.
The JV Raiders recorded just two hits, singles from sophomores Jason Gainey and Jake Veach. Both had an RBI on those hits and freshman Steve James also registered an RBI on a groundout.
Freshmen Drew Gause (1.1 innings, 10 runs, nine hits) and Chase Woody (3.2 innings, seven runs, six hits) did the pitching for the team.
The JV Raiders (0-2, 0-2 SAC) will also travel to Pinecrest Tuesday and start at 5 p.m.
