The last time the St. Stanislaus baseball team made it to the South State finals was in 2015, when the Rock-A-Chaws went on to win the Class 4A state championship.
And now, SSC certainly hopes that the same scenario reproduces itself some eight years later.
St. Stanislaus earned a trio to the Class 3A South State title round with a 9-2 road win over home-standing Seminary Saturday night. The victory, coupled with a 9-0 Riocks win in Bay St. Louis on Tuesday, gave SSC a sweep of the two-game series against their fellow Region 8-3A foe. The teams split. pair of games in the regular season, and SSC finished as the second seed in the league for playoff purposes while the Bulldogs were the third seed.
St. Stanislaus is now 19-12 overall on the season, and the Rocks of head coach Brad Corley await the winner of the Clarkdale-St. Andrews Episcopl semifinal series. Clarkdale is up 1-0 in that match-up, and game two has been postponed twice and is now set to take place Monday night.
In Seminary Saturday night, the Bulldogs actually took a brief 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first in an attempt to keep their season alive at least for another two days or so.
But St. Stanislaus had other ideas.
The Rocks fought back with three runs in the top of the third to erase that advantage and take a 3-1 lead of their own. Hill Gainey and Brady Wallis each had run-scoring singles in the rally, while Chesley Rhodes scored on a Seminary after he walked earlier in the inning.
The Bulldogs scored a run in the bottom of the third to cut the deficit to 3-2, but that would be as close as Seminary would get.
Ole Miss signee Seth Farni helped The Rocks extended the lead to 5-2 blasting a two-run home run over the centerfield wall in the top of the fourth frame.
Corley’s crew then sealed the deal adding four more markers in the top of the fifth. Tate Murphy’s RBI-sacrifice fly plated Jeremy Mares, and Wiley Mossy added an RBI-single to make it 7-2. ground out by Hugh LeMasters plated Mossy, and yet another run scored when SSC’s Brooks Ilgenfritz crossed the plate thanks to a Bulldog error completing the scoring for the Rocks.
LeMasters and Gainey had a pair of hits apiece to pace SSC at the plate in the winning nine-hit attack.
LeMaster also picked up the win on the mound, as he started and tossed four frames of two-hit ball striking out seven in the process and allowing both runs. Farni replaced him and the fifth and held the Bulldogs hitless and scoreless over the next three stanzas to wrap up the series-clinching win.
