Baseball Preview: Heritage Hawks vs. Brookstone Cougars
Heritage is on a five-game streak of home wins, while Brookstone is on a six-game streak of away wins: one of those streaks is about to end. The Heritage Hawks will take on the Brookstone Cougars at 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday. The two teams are strolling into their matches after big wins in their previous games.
Heritage is headed into the matchup fresh off scoring the most runs they have all season. They blew past Gatewood 24-5. With that win, Heritage brought their scoring average up to 6.7 runs per game.
Cole Murphy was a major factor no matter where he played. He looked comfortable on the mound, pitching five innings while giving up three earned (and two unearned) runs off six hits. Murphy has been nothing but reliable: he hasn't given up more than two walks in seven consecutive pitching appearances. Murphy was even better at the plate, going 2-for-4 with a home run and five RBI.
In other batting news, Griggs Smith was incredible, firing off three home runs, seven RBI, and four runs while going 5-for-5. Another player making a difference was Landon Justice, who went 3-for-4 with two stolen bases, three runs, and four RBI.
Meanwhile, Brookstone can now show off 12 landslide victories after their most recent game on Tuesday. They put the hurt on Calvary Christian with a sharp 15-6 victory.
Davis Harris looked comfortable as he tossed two innings while giving up no earned runs or hits.
On the hitting side, Brookstone let Taylor Hancock and Madden Dismuke loose on the outfield. Hancock got on base in four of his five plate appearances with a home run, four RBI, and two runs, while Dismuke went 3-for-4 with a home run, three RBI, and two runs. Maxwell Jones was another key contributor, going 1-for-4 with a home run, two runs, and two RBI.
Heritage's win ended a five-game drought on the road and puts them at 17-11. As for Brookstone, they are on a roll lately: they've won ten of their last 12 contests, which provided a nice bump to their 21-5 record this season.
Fans could be in store for some top-tier slugging on Wednesday. Heritage hasn't had any problems when it comes to power this season, having averaged 0.8 home runs per game. However, it's not like Brookstone struggles in that department as they've been averaging 0.7. With so much power on both teams, it'll be down to the pitchers to keep the mound locked down.
Heritage couldn't quite finish off Brookstone in their previous matchup on April 9th and fell 6-4. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Brookstone's Brennan Neal, who pitched three innings while giving up just one earned run off three hits. Now that Heritage knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
