BASEBALL: East Laurens finds Edge in rematch with ACE, gets win to finish 2-2 week

East Laurens threw a big wrinkle into the continually unfolding region 2-High A title race Friday as it turned the tables on ACE Charter in the second game of the teams’ two-part series. 

After getting run-ruled 16-1 by the Gryphons earlier in the week, Grayson Edge and the Falcons handed them a 4-2 loss as the series concluded in Macon to initiate an earlier-than-expected shakeup at the top of the standings, where Dublin is now the only team that remains without a region loss. 

Edge struck out four and held ACE to only five hits as he went the distance on the mound, contributing a key RBI single to his lineup’s seven-hit effort at the plate. And for the first time since the Dodge series a week earlier, East (8-10, 5-6 region) was errorless in the field as it made the routine plays needed to secure its lead from early in the ballgame. 

“Grayson pitched a great game,” said East Laurens head coach Vic Thigpen. “He was able spot his fastball and was able to keep them off balance with his curveball and changeup. Grayson continues to get better on the mound. Our pitching staff is young and they are starting to show the growth and maturity that we need.”

The big victory capped a 2-2 week for the Falcons, who rebounded from Tuesday’s home loss to ACE with a 6-2 win over Tattnall County back in East Dublin on Wednesday, but dropped their rematch with the Battle Creek Warriors 10-2 the following afternoon in Reidsville. 

East Laurens was set to open this week with a visit to Montgomery County, before two with Southwest Macon (Tuesday at home, Friday in Macon) and one to finish an incomplete series with Jefferson County Wednesday in Louisville. 

Against teams the caliber of ACE, the Falcons’ early leads – when they’ve managed to get them – have rarely been safe this season. Despite a run of insurance it picked up in the seventh to offset one by the Gryphons in their half of the sixth, East Laurens wouldn’t have ultimately needed more than the two it scored to break an early 1-1 tie and go ahead for good in the top of the second. 

Edge, who walked only two in his seven innings of work, kept ACE hitters off balance the rest of the way. 

The Falcons came up with seven hits in their second look at Gryphons’ top hurler Will Makowski, who went back to the mound after Tuesday’s light work – consisting of only 40 pitches and strikeouts of seven out of the 11 Eastside hitters he faced. 

Though the 6-foot-3 junior’s mid-80s heat was too much for them to catch up with on Tuesday, they squared him up with several good swings in Friday’s first couple innings. 

“The biggest difference was our patience at the plate,”  Thigpen said. “We didn’t swing at bad pitches and we made him throw more pitches.”

The Falcons followed up an error that helped Konner O’Neal become their first to reach base with back-to-back singles from Logan Gibson and Edge to score the afternoon’s first run. 

ACE answered in the bottom half with a run on hits by Chase Sasser and Camden Bailey, but Edge got Sebastian Falduti to fly out to end the inning, and East Laurens was able to take the lead coming back in the top of the second. 

Sam Wynn led off with a base hit, Nollan Scott was hit by a pitch and Conner Lawrence singled to load the bases before O’Neal took a 3-1 pitch into the gap for a double to drive in two. 

The score remained 3-1 until the sixth, when Makowski gave way to Will Mincey and ACE finally struck back to cut its deficit to one on hits by Aiden Sanderson and Huck Thompson. 

But once again, Edge made some big pitches to get out of the inning, getting Bailey on a strikeout to end the inning and strand the tying run. 

Then Mincey walked home a run – Wynn drawing his fourth in a row (out of five total, against no Falcon hits) to follow free passes for O’Neal, Gibson and Edge – to undo the progress just before the Gryphons’ last chance at the plate. 

Falduti doubled with one out to give the home team some life. But the final two outs followed quickly as Trey Barton and Mincey were retired to end the game. 

On top of a field day for ACE offensively, Tuesday’s series opener was a tragedy of errors for East Laurens, which had four that rendered 10 of the 12 runs allowed by its starting pitcher Lawrence unearned. The senior struck out two, and walked only three, in his three innings of action. 

The Gryphons found a lot of holes – the gap at short for three singles in a row during a three-run third inning – for their 11 hits, of which only three went for an extra base. 

Thompson (with the lead of three RBIs), Bailey, Sasser and Slade Hodge all had two of them apiece. 

It was scoreless through one, but a nine-run second inning did about all the damage ACE would need to put the game on a fast-track to victory. 

Makowski held the Falcons to only two hits – by O’Neal and Gibson – in his three innings of shutout work. East would get its only run off his reliever Carter Lewis in the bottom of the fourth, at which point the Gryphons had scored seven unanswered to supplement the earlier advantage. 

O’Neal was 2-for-2, and joined Edge with two RBIs, in Wednesday’s rebound to out-hit Tattnall County 6-5. 

The Falcons also stole nine bases to help maximize their offensive production behind Brody Kight, who struck out seven and walked only two in six innings of five-hit ball, with his only run unearned. 

Wynn gave up the other, likewise unearned, as he faced six with a hit and a walk in the last of the seventh. But the Battle Creek Warriors could only cut East’s five-run lead down to the final four. 

The Falcons opened the game with three runs in a big first inning, as Myles Burke tripled and scored on the stolen base of O’Neal, who had gotten on via walk. Logan Gibson singled to left to move him along before Edge hammered both in on another base hit. 

They padded the lead with one in the third and two in the fourth, on respective RBIs by Kight and O’Neal.  

Another rough second inning – with Tattnall striking for seven in the home half – was East’s undoing on Thursday. 

The Warriors would score three additional runs, with East picking up one each in the third and fourth on the RBIs of Kight and Cade Oliver. But Wynn and Scott had their only two hits against a trio of opposing pitchers. 

Tattnall’s Brody Chambless, Connor Dutton and Aiden Brock combined to strike out five and walk six. 

Chambless had three RBIs. 

Oliver, Wynn and Gibson pitched for the Falcons, together walking eight and striking out one.