Dorchester Academy wins SCISA AA baseball state title

St. George – Brent Jackson thought his Dorchester Academy baseball teams of the past two seasons had what it took to bring home a state championship. For whatever reason, that didn’t happen either year.

It did this season.

The Raiders went undefeated in the postseason, sweeping Calhoun Academy in the best-of-3 championship series to capture the SCISA AA state title.

“It means everything,” Jackson the DA head coach, said following Dorchester’s 5-1 clinching win in St. Matthews on May 13. “The past two years to come up short and finally come out on top the way we did, it felt good.”

The Raiders went 6-0 in sweeping its three playoff series. They finished with an overall record of 18-6 after going 12-6 during the regular and winning the Region 1 championship with a 7-1 record.

“We got hot at the right time,” Jackson said.

DA received strong pitching in both games against CA, which finished third in Region 1 but advanced to the championship series for the second straight year by knocking off defending state champion Patrick Henry Academy in the semifinal series. Dorchester, which won the first game 6-2, got strong pitching and timely hitting in both contests.

The timely hit came early for the Raiders in the final game. Nicholas Pinckney cranked a 3-run home run in the top of the first inning to spot them a fast lead. Connor Hartzog and Wayland Gruber reached in front of Pinckney before he cranked the homer.

“It was a fastball low and inside,” said Pinckney, DA’s catcher who has signed to play collegiately with University of South Carolina Union. “That's my pitch. It was a 3-1 count and I was waiting on it.”

“That was just huge for us,” Jackson said. “To do that against their ace, Connor Hayes, that set the tone. He really settled down after that.”

Dorchester then rode the pitching of starter Mason Fender and Gruber, the team’s closer, to the victory. Fender pitched 4 1/3 innings, scattering five hits and two walks and allowing the one run. He didn’t strike out anyone.

Calhoun its lone run in the fifth when a Crews Felder groundout scored Davis Holeman. That’s when Gruber came on in relief of Fender to get out of the inning without any further damage.

Gruber worked the final 2 2/3 innings to get the save. He struck out three and didn’t allow a hit or a walk.

“Both of them pitched really well,” Jackson said. “Our defense was on point and did great.”

“Mason did a great job,” Pinckney said. “He relies on his off speed, and I don't think he missed a single pitch. When he needed to use his fastball he was effective with it. Wayland’s been our ace that we’ve gone to all year.”

The Raiders finished with six hits, all of them coming from a different player. Pinckney, of course, had the big blow with his 3-run jack. Gruber was 1-for-4 with two runs batted in on a base hit in the top of the seventh that scored Fender and Hartzog. Hartzog was 1-for-4 with two runs.

Also picking up hits were Aiden McDaniel, Tyler Westbury and Landon Holley.

        Getting hits for the Cavaliers, who finished with a 20-10 record, were Landon Barnes, Chase Strickland, Felder, Holeman and Jordan Noell.

Jackson said his squad, which has six seniors who were major contributors in Gruber, Fender, Pinckney, Ben Wimberly and Trey Freeman, brought it all together at the right time.

“We just started gelling together big time,” he said. “The bats started coming around. We were coming together picking each other up. We could do no wrong. Everything we touched turned to gold.”

Pinckney said this was a goal for the team from the beginning of the season.

“It feels great. I feel like I put so much work into this,” he said. “We got together before the season started and this was a goal of ours, to make it to the state level and win it. We had our ups and downs, but we were able to overcome them all.”