BY: NOLAN RUTH
MINERAL WELLS – The baseball season came to an end in District 8-3A with a fourth place tie between the Parker County rivals Peaster Greyhounds and Millsap Bulldogs. Both teams finished the scheduled district season with 7-7 records, setting up a winner-take-all game for the final playoff spot at Pratt Field in nearby Mineral Wells.
Peaster jumped out to an early lead and never looked back, surviving a late inning push by Millsap to take the win 4-2 and secure its spot in the postseason. The Greyhounds will face the Holliday Eagles in the first round later this week with dates, times and locations to be determined.
“This is one of our goals every single year,” head coach Cody Salyers said after the game. “We knew we were sitting in a good place, we just had to play our game.”
Senior pitcher Cade Cork got the win for the Greyhounds, pitching the full seven innings, only giving up two runs on two hits and striking out seven.
“His sophomore year, he was my ‘bring him in because he’s a strike thrower,’” Salyers commented. “Last year he had some ups and downs, this year he has done some good things but has been on the back burner from some of the other people. He’s a senior that just competes and he wants it. And I was like, man, nobody better to put on the mound than a senior that wants it.”
It did not take long for Peaster to get on the board as Aaron Alix drew a leadoff walk with the count full and later scored on a single by Ty Steedley.
In the second inning, Alix got aboard again with another walk and Slayte Robertson standing on second. Robertson stole third, and before the next pitch could even be thrown, Alix took second with the pitcher still holding the ball. This flustered Millsap’s defense who muffed the play in the infield, allowing both runners to score on Rylan Salyer’s ground ball. The Greyhounds lead 3-0 after two innings without allowing a baserunner.
In the third, Mark Tullous was hit by a pitch and ended up scoring two plays later when Colby Fields hit one over the second baseman to drive in the fourth run, which proved to be all Peaster needed. Despite continuously threatening on the base paths, they were unable to score another run.
Cork finally gave up a hit on a sharply hit ground ball in between the third baseman and the shortstop, but he did not give up much else. He carried a one hitter into the sixth inning when Millsap finally made some noise.
C.R. Tippie got a hold of a pitch and sent it to right field, ultimately getting a double out of it. Kai Hanog followed up with a single that put both runners at the corners. Jack Riggs then stepped up and grounded out to third but Tippie crossed the plate to put the Bulldogs on the board 4-1. Hanog then scored on a ground ball by starting pitcher Beldon Cox to make it 4-2 after six innings.
There was some thought for Peaster to make a change at pitcher, but Salyers decided to stick with his starter.
“We had two other guys ready,” Salyers mentioned. “That was part of the plan going into it…so we were ready whenever we needed to. But he competed so well the whole day…they didn’t hit the ball very well other than the one hard one to right field. He was making them put it in play and that’s all you can ask for.”
Tippie was the best player for Millsap in the game, going 2-2 with a double and a run scored, and 1.1 innings pitched with a strikeout.
In the seventh, Steedley tried to get the Greyhounds an insurance run. After being hit by a pitch, stealing second, and sacrificed over to third, the senior third baseman tried to steal home with two outs, but was easily tagged out as the Bulldogs were not fooled.
After two quick outs, Cork finished off the game in fitting form with his seventh strikeout to send Peaster into the postseason.
