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GROUP A BASEBALL: Honaker wins one for Coach Harding

Honaker turned tears of fear and sadness into tears of joy and elation in fairly short order Friday.

Just hours after discovering that longtime coach Tom Harding was in the hospital and would miss their state semifinal game, the Tigers wasted little time putting away Appomattox County, 21-1, to advance to the first state championship game in the program’s history.

Honaker will face J.J. Kelly in the Group A, Division 2 final this morning at Radford University in a rematch of last week’s Region D title game.

That contest began on a Friday night and ended on a Saturday morning, and it took 10 innings to decide the outcome.

The outcome of Honaker’s state semifinal game was decided shortly after it began.

Cory Brown drove in six runs with four hits, including a home run, while Tre Bunn, Austin Kiser and Payton Ball combined for nine hits, six RBIs and 10 runs for Honaker, which sent 12 men to the plate and scored eight runs in the first inning.

The Tigers led 10-0 after two innings and built a 19-0 lead by the fourth, pounding out 21 hits off four Raiders pitchers.

“We came in from the get-go swinging the bats,” said Honaker assistant coach Alex Zachwieja, who filled in for Harding. “Everything just fell into place.

“Everybody contributed, defensively and offensively. We played the type of game we had to play today. I can’t say enough about the way these kids stepped up.”

The way the game played out was the perfect antidote for a team that started off the day in a fog thicker than anything it encountered on the drive to Radford.

“I can’t tell you what coach Harding means to me as an assistant for 22 years, or what he means to all these boys,” Zachwieja added. “We had him in mind all day. Hopefully, we can continue with this kind of focus tomorrow.”

The Tigers delivered one loud hit after another, starting with two-run singles from Brown and Derrick Murphy in the first inning.

“I shortened up and just tried to put the ball in play,” said Brown, who added a three-run blast to left in the fourth. “[The home run] felt good. That was probably the longest ball I’ve hit.

“It feels good. We just got hit after hit. That was pretty much the first game we’ve done that.”

Just a freshman, Kiser added a towering homer in the second. In the third Honaker got four straight singles and then a two-run triple by Jordon Dye.

It helped ease the way for winning pitcher Chaz Miller, who threw a five-hitter. Miller, who has had recent control problems, walked just one batter and he struck out seven, which is also a low number for the hard-throwing senior.

“I let off on some of my pitches trying to get them in there. I just tried to throw strikes,” said Miller, who added coach Harding was always on the players’ minds. “We wanted to win this one for him.”

Miller and Murphy added two hits apiece. Bunn reached base five times and was in on two double plays, one of them a 6-3 twin killing to end the fourth.

Appomattox scored its only run on a single by Bruce Bradshaw in the seventh.

Tom Harding, meanwhile, was resting comfortably after undergoing successful heart surgery, with two stents put in Friday afternoon at Bristol Regional Medical Center. He is hoping his doctors will allow him to at least ride to Radford to watch today’s championship game.

“I talked to Tom at the hospital this morning and he was highly disappointed that he couldn’t be here, to say the least,” Zachwieja said. “I hate it for him, I hate it for his family, that they’re not here enjoying this right now.

“I imagine, if there’s any way possible, we’re hoping, I’m hoping he’ll be here. We’ll try and play a quality game and win this for coach Harding. We have a chance to bring a state championship back to Honaker, for Honaker High School and our community, and you don’t want to let an opportunity like this slip by.”

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 6th, 2011 and is filed under Education News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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