By Calli Townsend
The District 7 Little League tournament for the Junior boys division began last night, July 5, in Richmond, Michigan. St. Clair took on Emmett in the first game, followed by the Richmond-Marine City matchup.
St. Clair v. Emmett (12-2)
In one of two strong performances by Blue Water Area teams, St. Clair defeated Emmett 12-2 in four innings.
Ryan Pettinger took the mound first for St. Clair, striking out two of three batters in the top of the inning. From there, the St. Clair pitching staff went on to strike out eight more batters.
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The second inning proved to be the most productive for St. Clair’s lineup. Four consecutive hits by Haslem and Turner who each had a single, and Pettinger and Lindman who each hit a double, all crossed home plate to add four runs to the board. Two more runs were later scored to total eight runs on the game.
With the score 8-2 heading into the bottom of the fourth, St. Clair sparked its bats one more time to add four more runs. With the 10-run rule in effect, the Saints marched Marine City to end the game.
Richmond v. Marine City (14-2)
It was another four-inning game at the Richmond Little League fields when the host of the tournament defeated Marine City 14-2.
Richmond took the early lead, 1-0 in the top of the first. Marine City answered with two runs in the bottom of the second to top Richmond, 2-1.
In the top of the third, two Richmond batters walked followed by a single by Jacob Fink to load the bases. Brett Matyunas came up to the plate next to hit a double to send two runners home, reclaiming the lead. Richmond went on to score two more runs that inning, sparking its momentum for the remainder of the game.
“That was the turning point in the game I think. Matyunas had a huge hit, Aiden Sutherland had a big hit again, Matthew Yelencich drew a big walk, he was really good on the base path,” head coach Brad Sutherland said. “Yelencich behind the plate was spectacular yesterday. He really helped our pitching staff for sure. There was just a lot of overall really good team effort.”
In addition to an excellent scoring run, one of the Richmond batters got his first hit of his newly-started career.
“We were super happy. Alex Starks, this is his year playing and he hit the ball for the first time, it was awesome,” Brad Sutherland said. “Everyone was just super happy about that.”
It was 8-2 by the bottom of the fourth, and Richmond scored six more runs that inning to mercy Marine City.
Sutherland was the winning pitcher on the day after coming in for Fink.
“Surherland was the second pitcher that came in. We had Fink at our starting pitcher that day, he was really good, he just didn’t have quite as much as he usually does and Marine City actually pulled ahead of us at the end of the second,” Brad Sutherland said. “We just didn’t want any more momentum going their way.”
Marine City and Emmett will play tonight at 6 p.m followed by St. Clair against Richmond at 8 p.m. in Richmond.
