Soddy-Daisy, Sequatchie County win district baseball championships

Baseball on green grass baseball tile / Getty Images
Baseball on green grass baseball tile / Getty Images

Trailing by a run to begin the final inning, Soddy-Daisy's baseball team rallied for three in the seventh to knock off top-seeded Bradley Central 8-6 for the District 5-AAA championship Wednesday night.

The Trojans, who entered the tournament as the No. 3 seed, struck for five runs in the third then took the lead with a clutch seventh, highlighted by Seth Coffelt's one-out, two-run double that put them ahead.

"The kids' never-say-die attitude stands out to me," said first-year Trojans coach Jim Higgins. "We got down to our final two outs, but they battled hard. We went down early by several runs and they stayed resilient throughout.

"We have known we had a good team from day one. The first part of the season, we were through our first seven or eight losses - we weren't getting beat, we were beating ourselves. It's been a transition, and it's taken a whole season to do it. They learned about their resilience as a team and their fight. There were times we had our backs against the wall but we came back."

Zane Guess earned the win in relief, striking out four. At the plate for the Trojans (22-12), Spencer Gore and Hayden Maynor each went 2-for-4 and Garrett Dent and Landon Maynor each drove in a run.

» In District 7-AA, Sequatchie County's long postseason drought in baseball is over.

The Indians got one run in the third, added another in the sixth and rode a strong pitching night from junior Zach Lockhart - along with solid defense behind him - for a 2-0 win over Grundy County to win the league title.

It is the program's first district tournament title in 19 seasons.

"In Zach's last three outings in relief, he had pounded the strike zone and gotten a lot of ground-ball outs, so we thought he matched up well with Grundy's hitters," Indians coach Derrin Easterly said. "We've talked about defense all year, and those guys really backed Zach up and showed up tonight when we needed them."

Collin Hudson lined a two-out single to bring home the first run. Lockhart, who had mostly pitched in relief this season, scattered four hits in a complete game.

Sequatchie County (22-10-1) will host Cannon County in a Region 4-AA semifinal Monday.

"For these kids and this program to get to host a region game next week is just a really big deal," Easterly said. "You can definitely see them playing with so much confidence now. This is huge for us."

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