Speedster Jordan Flemming ducks under the Fort Mill tag and slides for second. | Ross Burton
FORT MILL – Blythewood made a long march to Fort Mill Tuesday night for a non-region contest with the Fort Mill High School Yellow Jackets, and it proved to be a sweet trip for the Bengals. Despite outhitting the Fort Mill by 10, it took Blythewood eight innings to swat the pesky Yellow Jackets.
Bengals’ starting pitcher Ben Lang-Spittler and Fort Mill’s Logan Stone both had solid nights on the mound and cruised through the first two innings. John Lanier scored the first run of the game on a Jackets’ error, but the 1-0 lead disappear in the bottom half of the inning.
Blythewood led off the bottom of the inning with consecutive errors that allowed Bartow Keller to score the Yellow Jackets’ first run. Later in the inning, Griffin Reddeck gave Fort Mill a 2-1 lead with a ground-out that scored Shane Boyle.
Jordan Flemming singled to begin the Bengals’ half of the fourth inning. The speedy Flemming eventually rounded the bases to score on a dropped third-strike. Fort Mill struck back in the bottom of the fourth after Drew Hartman came through with a RBI-double.
Then Lang-Spittler and Stone took control of the game again, quieting the bats until the eighth inning. Lang-Spittler picked up the victory, pitched seven strong innings, struck out five, allowed three hits and only gave up one earned run. Stone tossed six innings, struck out six and also only allowed one earned run.
The eighth inning belonged to the Bengals. Jordan Flemming began extra innings with a line drive to right field, and, a batter later, Brady Carson singled to left field. Lang-Spittler drove in Flemming from third base with bunt-single.
Later in the inning, with two outs, Landon Lucas pushed the lead to 5-3 with an RBI-single that scored Lang-Spittler. Next up was Jansen Stokes and gave the Bengals some valuable insurance runs with a two RBI-double to left field.
Jake Ladd came on in the bottom of the eight and closed the door on the Yellow Jackets.
FMHS:0-0-2-1-0-0-0-0- 3
BHS:0-0-1-1-0-1-0-4-7
PITCHING: BHS– Ben Lang-Spittler (W) 7IP, 3H, 3R, 0ER, 1BB, 5K. Jake Ladd, 1IP, 0R, 0ER, 0BB, 5K. FMHS – Logan Stone (L), 6IP, 7H, 3R, 1ER, 1BB, 6K. Miguel Pringle, .2IP, 5H, 4R, 3ER, 1BB, 1K. Dylan Helms, 1.2IP, 6H, 4R, 4ER, 1BB, 0K. Zack MacDonald, .1IP, 0H, 0R, 0ER, 1BB, 0K.
HITTING: 1B – Ben Lang-Spittler, Brady Beasley, John Lanier, Landon Lucas (3), Josh Cowan,Jordan Flemming (2), Zach Bailes, Brady Carson, (BCHS). Justin Kesovetz, Carson Jones, (FMHS). 2B – Josh Cowan, Jansen Stokes (2), (BHS). Drew Hartman, (FMHS).