Baseball Preview: Tampa Catholic Crusaders vs. Bishop Verot Vikings
Tampa Catholic is 0-3 against Bishop Verot since April of 2015 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Saturday. The Tampa Catholic Crusaders will head out on the road to square off against the Bishop Verot Vikings at 7:00 p.m. Both teams are coming into the contest red-hot, with Tampa Catholic sitting on four straight wins and Bishop Verot on seven.
Tampa Catholic is on a roll after a high-stakes playoff matchup on Wednesday. They won by a run and slipped past Avon Park 4-3.
Dominic Woodward made a splash while hitting and pitching. He looked comfortable on the mound, tossing an inning while giving up no earned runs off one hit. Woodward was also solid in the batter's box, scoring a run while going 1-for-3.
Woodward wasn't the only one making solid contact as three players wound up with at least one hit. One of them was Carson Arnold, who went 1-for-3 with a stolen base and an RBI. Hershey Sanchez was another key contributor, scoring a run and stealing a base while getting on base in two of his three plate appearances.
Meanwhile, Bishop Verot stacked a 15th blowout win onto their ever-increasing hoard on Wednesday. They beat Clearwater Central Catholic by the very same score they won with in their prior game: 8-0. Bishop Verot's pitching crew has been rock solid lately; the team hasn't given up a run in their last three matches.
Blake Lavenia looked comfortable as he pitched two innings while giving up no earned runs or hits.
On the hitting side, the team relied heavily on Braylon Sheffield, who scored a run while going 3-for-3. The team also got some help courtesy of Maddix Simpson, who scored a run and stole a base while going 2-for-4.
Tampa Catholic is on a roll lately: they've won eight of their last nine matchups, which provided a nice bump to their 19-8 record this season. As for Bishop Verot, they pushed their record up to 22-5 with that victory, which was their 12th straight at home dating back to last season.
Tampa Catholic couldn't quite finish off Bishop Verot when the teams last played back in April and fell 5-3. Can Tampa Catholic avenge their loss or is history doomed to repeat itself? We'll find out soon enough.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
