HIGH SCHOOL BASEBALL: Honaker Edges J.J. Kelly For Region D Tournament Title

BY ANTHONY STEVENS
Sports Correspondent

HONAKER, Va. — You can bet Honaker head coach Tom Harding is enjoying his birthday today. The Tigers gave him a huge present a day early.

Honaker rallied to knock off defending regional champion J.J. Kelly 7-6 on Friday night at Harding Field to win the first Region D baseball title in school history.

It’s the first regional title in Harding’s illustrious career. He is in his 38th year as head coach of the Tigers and they’ve advanced to the regional tournament 16 consecutive years. But win No. 466 on his ledger had to be special.

“When you’re around a great group of kids like this, you’re not going to get old, no matter how many birthdays you’ve had,” an elated Harding said. “This is special, these kids won a regional championship when they weren’t even supposed to be here. The kids are here when no one but us thought they could be.

“They’ve did this all year long. Behind, behind, behind but they never ever quit. It’s a big thing for me but I’m more happy for this group of young men.”

The Tigers turned to a freshman on the mound and he delivered. Derrick Murphy pitched a complete game to get the win. He struggled with his control the first three innings, pitching behind in the count and allowing five early runs.

“I was having trouble locating the fastball and couldn’t really get my curveball down,” Murphy said. “After the first three innings I started to get my pitches down in the zone. We started hitting the ball too and that got me more excited. My defense was solid the whole game, without them I would have never won this game.”

Murphy walked three batters in the first inning and one run scored but it could have been worse if not for an outstanding double play. In the second inning, Chris Strouth and Zak Clifton each drove in runs for the Indians. Devan Sproles and Griffin Kopp drove in runs as two more crossed the plate for the Indians in the third inning to take a 5-1 lead.

“We played fairly well in two-thirds of the game,” J.J. Kelly coach Dave Wyrick said. “Pitching was good, I thought Justin Wilson threw well for us and we swung the bats. But this time of year you have to play all three phases of the game and our defense was lacking. Honaker did and we didn’t, they deserved to win.”

Murphy slowed the J.J. Kelly (21-4) bats in the middle innings and Honaker began to peck away at the lead, aided by some Indian miscues. In the fourth inning, Clay Smith and Aaron Whited scored on an error to cut the lead to two runs.

Honaker (21-3) then tied the game with a two-out rally in the fifth. Adam Honaker tripled to deep right and Smith followed with a two-run home run to right.

“I’ve been swinging the bat pretty well lately,” said Smith who also had a homer in the semifinal win over Gate City. “You just have to go with the outside pitch and take it the other way. It just feels great to get Coach Harding the championship, he deserves it.”

Justin Hall scored the go-ahead run for Honaker in the sixth and the Tigers added a much-needed insurance run when Fisher Wilson singled and scored on a double by Kevin Lester to give Honaker a 7-5 lead.

Murphy retired the first two he faced in the seventh. But a couple of singles and a hit batter pushed a run across for Kelly. With the tying run at second and the go-ahead run at first Murphy got out of the inning with a groundout to clinch the win and the regional title.

Honaker will host James River in a Group A state quarterfinal on Tuesday. J.J. Kelly will travel to Glenvar the same day.

J.J. Kelly 122 000 1 — 6 10 5
Honaker 010 222 x — 7 8 2
J. Wilson, Sturgill (6) and Kopp. Murphy and H. Wilson. W—Murphy (5-0). L—Sturgill (6-3). HR—Smith (H), 5th one on.