After defeating Athens Academy and Prince Avenue, last week the Commerce baseball Tigers are sitting comfortably in the number two spot in 8-A, just behind Lakeview Academy.
The Tigers are 7-1 in region play and 10-6 overall, with region opponent Town County coming up on Thursday.
Towns County (1-5; 3-9) will host Commerce April 16 at 5:30 at Young Harris College.
The Tigers have won the past seven meetings between the schools, including a 3-0 shutout in March.
Last week, Commerce defeated Athens Academy and Prince Avenue before getting shut out 3-0 by Jefferson.
Against Athens Academy, the Tigers outlasted the Spartans, 11-10.
Carl Allen started on the mound. He went five innings, struck out seven and went 2-for-4 at the plate. T. Green got the win with two shutout innings of relief. He also had a good night at the plate, going 2-for-3 with an RBI.
Josh Streetman went 2-for-4 and had the game-winning RBI, while Paul Ford went 3-for-3 and Cody Streetman hit a three-run homer.
Up next for the Tigers was Prince Avenue last Thursday.
In a five-inning game, Commerce beat the Wolverines 13-1.
Josh Swisstak got the win on the mound. He struck out six and drove in two with a double to help his own cause.
Ethan Thomas went 2-for-3 with two RBIs and Green went 2-for-2 with two RBIs.
Saturday, Commerce traveled to Jefferson where they were blanked 3-0 by the Dragons.
Despite the loss, Commerce Coach Steve Cotrell said that it was a great baseball game and it was a good preparation for the final stretch.
“[Jefferson’s] pitching was very good, but it is like I told our guys, if you want to make a run in the state playoffs we have got to be able to make adjustments at the plate and put pressure on pitchers of that caliber,” said Cotrell. “The main thing is that we needed to see that type of pitching to get us ready for the downhill stretch of the season.”
The Tiger pitchers were up to the task. They didn’t surrender an earned run, but Tiger errors proved costly.
T. Green got tagged with the loss, going three innings and striking out two. Thomas came in for an inning before Allen finished the game, striking out four in two innings.
Chase Barnett picked up the teams’ only hit.
“We made three mistakes that came back to hurt us,” Cotrell said. “Both of us [Commerce and Jefferson] threw our region starters for a couple of innings. The difference in the game was that their outfielders made four great plays in the outfield and our outfielders made two errors that cost us two runs.”
