Friday, April 17, 2009

Babbling

Northern Nash has beaten Southern Nash tonight in baseball to hang close to the Gryphons at 3-1 in the conference standings.

If you remember they were rained out earlier with Fike and the makeup game will be part of a double header when Fike comes to Northern on the second round of conference games.

Northern Plays at Rocky Mount next Thursday night and then Fike on the following Tuesday. Those three games will tell us a lot in conference play for this year..

Cousin Lauren Doughtie is tied for 9th in the ACC women's Golf championship after one round. She shot a 74 Friday for the Wolfpack.

The Boston Celtics have heard the news : It looks like no Kevin Garnett on the playoffs, without him no repeat for the Celtics.

The Carolina Hurricanes have evened up their playoff series with New Jersey. Tim Gleason scored an overtime goal and the Hurricanes head home for game three tied 1-1 with the Devils. Since the Hurricanes are the lower seeded team they need one in New Jersey to get the home court advantage and they got that tonight. 2-1 over the Devils.

The Rocky Mount Gryphons continue to get unbelievable pitching. In the 14 games played so far this year only once has the opposing team had more than one run after four innings. That was the lost to Rose( 4 runs) in which the Gryphons tied it up in the seventh only to lose in the ninth.

Hobbs Johnson at this point in the season at 6-0 may be the best pitcher in the state. Since Hobbs has been so out standing Sophomore Benton Moss has has to take a back seat but he is undefeated on the year. Nick Hahula and Dillon Cockrell have been trust worthy every time they have taken to the hill.

One weakness that the Gryphons have shown so far as they have been held down by good opposing pitchers. They could only get four against Fike Thursday and only five against Tyler Joyner in the opening conference game against Northern.

If the Gryphons are to win the conference or even advance any where in the playoffs the bats have to wake up. They can't depend on a one hitter by our pitchers every time out.

One thing that has help the pitchers is they are not walking that many. Whenever you have runners on base and that puts pressure on the defense and errors occur. A good example of that was the Northern game. Joyner walked two in the fifth and an error and the Gryphons win.

Baseball has two home games next week Nash Central and Northern Nash. Tuesday's tilt with Central is the last game in cycle one. The Northern game starts the second time around. The best news is four of the last six conference games are at home.