The North Sunflower Academy baseball team opened the season with a 6-3 road win over Regents Academy in Oxford last week.
This past Tuesday, the team took to the road again, this time a trek to Sharkey Issaquena Academy but came out on the losing end, 13 – 3.
Today, the team heads to Humphreys Academy to take on the Rebels and then will turn around and host the Belzoni-based Rebels in Drew on Friday. All games have the first pitch of 4 p.m. The team will then have a week off and return to the diamond on Tuesday, March 15 to host Lee Academy (Arkansas.)
“The Regents game was a good one,” Coach Anthony Rivera said. “Everybody was on point and we jumped out early on them 3-0. But we walked the bases loaded and they got a run in. I pitched Brandon Daniels the whole game. Everybody’s sticks were working well. It was a good season opener.”
The Rebels lost to Regents last year after having a five-run lead to eventually lose 15-5.
“It was good for them to shake that morale off of them,” he said.
“It was a rough one but it was a good one,” Coach Rivera said of the Sharkey loss. “It was 5-3 till about the fifth inning but pitching inexperience kicked in. A young pitcher hit a couple of guys with the bases loaded. It was a great game overall. I would feel bad if they out-sticked us but we hurt ourselves loading the bases.”
He instructed his team that “these non-conference games are the perfect time to win and learn. You don’t lose when you learn something about yourself,” he said. “We were happy with our win against Regents and we learned something in this game with Sharkey.”
Coach Rivera pointed out that senior lead-off batter and shortstop Dalton Hollis had a big game.
“I had to rotate pitchers and ended the game with my senior mix on the mound,” he said. “Defensive-wise, I was very proud of my guys. Once we work out the kinks and get more pitchers, we’ll be fine.”
