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Wheeling Post 1 Exacts Some Revenge

Post 1 opens tourney by beating So. Chas.

Photo by Cody Tomer Brian Campbell, left, tips his cap as he is greated by teammates after hitting a home run in the seventh inning of Wednesday’s state tournament game at Moundsville.

 

MOUNDSVILLE — Wheeling Post 1, the defending state tournament champions, began its run at back-to-back West Virginia Legion championships with a 7-5, opening-round victory against South Charleston Post 94 on Wednesday Valley Fork Park.

Wheeling (28-11) came out agressive in the first inning and plated the game’s first run and never trailed.

“We knew coming into (this) that we were prepared after two great days of practice,” Manager Mark Delbrugge said. “You saw that with the emotion that we came out with.”

Wheeling will face Romney, which beat Moundsville, at 4 p.m. today.

Post 1 fell to Post 94 twice during the regular season by counts of 10-3 and 13-3, so Delbrugge and his squad knew they were in for a fight.

South Charleston actually out-hit Wheeling by a 13-6 mark on Wednesday, but Post 94 also stranded 12 men on base while Post 1 left eight runners on the base paths.

Brian Shaw, Tyler Ashbrook and Colton Coss escaped trouble much of the day, combining for five strikeouts and six walks.

Shaw started and earned a victory by going five innings and Ashbrook followed with three frames, before Coss came in to close out the ballgame in the ninth.

“Shaw got us into the sixth, Ashbrook was fantastic to bridge the gap to Colton and Coss was lights out for us, just as he has been for two years now,” Delbrugge said. “If we can get that kind of pitching that we got, then we can play with anybody.”

Wheeling was near-perfect on the defensive side of the things, committing just one error, while South Charleston had four in the loss.

Brian Campbell delivered the big hit in the seventh when he belted a solo home run to center-field, to add to his two-hit game and his team-high three RBI.

Chad Harper and Gage Giovengo also accounted for a pair of hits each to help spark the Wheeling offense.

“We took advantage of their miscues,” Delbrugge said. “We kept the pressure on them, hit the ball hard, put it in play and it paid off. If we can continue to swing the bats like that and get good pitching, then hopefully we can be there come Saturday.”

Post 1 came out swinging and it was Harper’s bat that brought in the first run with an RBI double to plate Coss, who reached on a fielder’s choice.

After a pair of walks in the third, Harper delivered another RBI hit, followed by an RBI groundout by Campbell to extend the Wheeling lead to 3-0 heading to the home half of the frame.

A leadoff walk came around to score the first run of the game for South Charleston in the third, but Wheeling got back to business in the fifth with a three-run inning.

After a groundout to start the fifth, Coss was hit by a pitch, then Harper reached base safely on a throwing error. Campbell drove in his second run with another RBI groundout to plate Coss. Giovengo followed with an RBI single to bring Harper into score, giving Wheeling a 6-1 advantage.

South Charleston kept its hopes alive by plating a pair of runs in the fifth, cutting the lead to 6-3 until the seventh, when Campbell crushed the homer over the fence in center to give Wheeling the momentum.

Post 94 tallied one run in the bottom of the seventh and added another in the eighth on a home run to left by Trevor Sampson, but it was not enough to keep up with the defending champions.

“They know we are defending champions,” the coach said. “None of the other five teams in the tournament can say that so they are all chasing us but we have a long way to go.

“This is a huge step for us. We move into the winner’s bracket and hopefully won’t eat up as much pitching down the road.”

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