LEBANON, Va. – Tennessee High senior Isaac Blevins has made an important adjustment.
However, it has nothing to do with the mechanics of his swing, how he positions himself defensively while playing first base or the way he navigates the basepaths.
This was a change regarding his deportment and occurred after he had some struggles last week when the Vikings played three baseball games in South Carolina.
“I had a little bit of trouble down there with my attitude and stuff,” Blevins said. “I had a really good talk with my coaches. … We have a lot of youth on this team, and I want to be a leader and do what I need to do for this team.”
Blevins was a major contributor on Monday as he went 2-for-4 with an RBI double as the Vikings earned a 12-3 victory over the Lebanon Pioneers and completed a season sweep of the squad from Southwest Virginia.
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THS (10-3) dropped two of its three games at the Ripken Experience in Myrtle Beach and recently lost slugger Dayne Musick (.450, two home runs, nine RBIs) to a season-ending knee injury.
The Vikings trailed 3-2 after two innings on Monday, but any concerns for the Bristolians dissipated as they closed the game with 10 unanswered runs.
Just call it a return to form.
“I’m really proud of our guys,” said Tennessee High coach Preston Roberts. “It starts with pitching and defense. We also had timely hitting with guys in scoring position.”
To his point: Kaleb Feathers tossed six strong innings, the Vikings committed just one error and six different players had hits.
Roberts was particularly impressed with a three-run outburst in the third inning that occurred with two outs and gave Tennessee High the lead for good.
Cainan Meyers connected for the go-ahead two-run double, and Blevins followed that up with his run-scoring two-bagger.
“We’re used to doing stuff like that and we’re really confident in our offense,” Blevins said. “We feel really good about our hitting.”
The top of the order set the tone as Preston Feagins (1-for-3, walk, two runs, RBI), Bryson Hutton (2-for-5, two runs, two RBIs) and Gage Graziano (1-for-3, walk, two runs, two RBIs) wreaked havoc all day.
“I was interested to see how we would respond with Dayne being out,” Roberts said. “He had had a phenomenal start to the season. I’m really proud of the next-man-up mentality that our team showed.”
Having a varsity veteran like Blevins – who is batting in the six-hole – doesn’t hurt either.
“He’s played a lot of baseball for us and he came up with a couple of big hits,” Roberts said.
The Tennesseans also took advantage of six Lebanon errors.
“If you give a good baseball team [extra] outs, they are going to take advantage of it,” said Lebanon coach Cody Compton. “We didn’t take advantage of it when we had the runners in scoring position.”
Leadoff man Eli Breeding had two hits and has a .500 batting average (10-for-20), while Noah Delp delivered a two-run single in the first inning for the Pioneers.
Nathan Phillips also drove in a run, while allowing just one hit and striking out six in four innings of relief.
“We came out and swung the bats well,” Compton said. “We just couldn’t make a play defensively.”
Lebanon (2-3) is still trying to hit its stride and Monday’s contest was the first game for the Pioneers in seven days. They travel to Eastside on Thursday and Abingdon on Saturday.
“We’ve got a long way to go,” Compton said. “We’re not a very good baseball team yet. … We’re not playing defense like we need to be and we have some other issues going on. We’re just not where we need to be yet.”
Meanwhile, Blevins now owns a batting average of .333 (13-for-39) to go along with that attitude adjustment.
“We just put together a bunch of good at-bats and that’s what we do,” Blevins said. “I love that we can take care of business and have a lot of fun doing it.”
Tennessee High plays Chapmanville (West Virginia) on Thursday at Cardinal Park in Johnson City.
Tennessee High 203 500 2—12 9 1
Lebanon 300 000 0—3 8 6
Feathers, Lambert (7) and Meyers. Godsey, Phillips (4) and Warren. W – Feathers (4-0). L – Godsey (1-1). HR – none.