The Salem High baseball team snapped a four game losing streak with a 15-8 win over Patrick Henry in Roanoke Tuesday.
The game was the first of four in a row for the Spartans this week and coach Jimmy Winterer called on Nate Biggar from the jayvee team to start on the mound. Nate pitched four innings and allowed no earned runs to get his first varsity win.
At the plate, Aiden Poff hit a two run homer over the leftfield fence at PH. Chase Rutledge and Mason Hale both had three hits.
The Spartans went 0-for-3 last week. After getting shut out by Hidden Valley, 6-0, at home on May 5th they lost two close games on the road, 10-9 at Northside on Wednesday and 11-8 at Christiansburg Friday.
Salem came from behind twice in the shoot-out at Northside. Hale drove in Trey Dent in the first inning to give the Spartans an early lead but the Vikings answered in the bottom of the second with six runs. An infield error, two walks and a hit batter kept the bases clogged and the Vikings delivered a couple clutch hits.
The Spartans scored three runs in the top of the third to cut the lead to 6-4. Dent singled to left, Hale doubled to right center gap, Brayden White tripled to center and Ben Farber doubled to right.
Mason Brown pitched into the sixth inning, giving up nine runs of which four were earned. Farber relieved Brown in the sixth and worked out of a jam, allowing the Spartans to tie the game at 9-9 in the top of the seventh. However, Farber walked the bases loaded in the bottom of the seventh and the game ended on a walk-off sacrifice fly.
The Spartans had 17 hits at Northside. Rutledge, Dent and Hale all had three hits while Zach Bocock, Landin Barton and Farber had two each.
On Friday the Spartans were in Christiansburg for a River Ridge District game and had a good hitting day again, but lost none the less by a score of 11-8. Salem scored all eight runs in the first four innings and led 8-0 into the bottom of the fourth.
Rutledge started on the mound for the Spartans and things looked good when Chase threw three scoreless innings. However, things went south in the fourth and the Demons rallied back against Rutledge and reliever Jack Stroud to tie the game at 8-8. Salem would not score again and Christiansburg put three more on the board for the win.
The Spartans have four games in four days this week. After Tuesday’s game with PH the Spartans were scheduled to host Lord Botetourt Wednesday, play at Glenvar today and host Pulaski County on Friday at 5:30 pm at Billy Sample Field.
