Ayden-Grifton's Aaron Pasour rounds the bases after a home run in Tuesday's first round playoff contest with North Lenoir. Photo by William Ha’ Hardy / Neuse News

By Scott Cole

The North Lenoir Hawks, second in the Eastern Carolina 2A Conference, hosted the fourth place Ayden-Grifton Chargers in the first round of the NCHSAA 2A state playoffs Tuesday.

The two teams split the conference matchups this season close games and it was expected that this game would’ve been close as well. Instead, led by a strong pitching performance by Austin Jones and an offensive outburst, the Chargers stunned the Hawks with an 11-1 victory.

The Chargers would hit three home runs to help push them past North Lenoir. With the win, Ayden-Grifton advances to the second round to face top seeded Washington on Friday.

“Sometimes you are the team celebrating and sometimes you are the one who are the sad ones on the sidelines. Tonight just wasn’t our night,” Hawks coach Jackson Massey said. “We thought that we’d be better prepared because we are familiar with them.  They came to play and we struggled. I hate that the season ends like this. I hate that it ended so early. We had a heck of a season and I wish it had a better ending than this.”

The Chargers struck early. Leadoff batter Jackson Upchurch walked to start the game, reached second on a fielder’s choice, and would score on an error. Two batters later, Jones crushed a pitch over the left field wall for a two-run shot.

“I have never hit a home run in high school before,” Jones said. “I was surprised that it happened.  I was really excited to see it go over that wall.”

“Over the last few years, we’ve hit the ball fairly well the later the season goes on,” Chargers coach Corey Skinner said. “This helped us a lot tonight. We were in the right mindset and the guys put it all together tonight.”

The Hawks would get on the board in the first inning as well. After a leadoff single, Howard would be sacrificed to second, and then would advance to third and home on a pair of passed balls.

“I started off walking people, “ Jones said. “I had to settle down and find my offspeed stuff. Once I did that, I got back in the grove.”

Jones would pitch a complete game, giving up four hits and three walks while striking out seven. Jones would also go 2 for 3 with a walk and 3 RBIs.

Ayden-Grifton was able to load the bases thanks to a pair of walks and single to start the second. Massey would pull Howard for Trevor Sears, who would walk his first batter, Jones, and then give up an RBI single to Josh Harris.

“That second inning was the key for us,” Skinner said. “They put up a run and we came back and scored some more to keep the momentum going. We had to make sure that they couldn’t rally back.”

The homers kept coming for Ayden-Grifton. Aaron Pasour led the third inning off with a solo shot to left center field to extend AG’s lead. In the following inning, Blake McLawhorn drove one over the right field fence to give the Chargers a 7-1 lead.

Meanwhile the Hawks could not generate any offense. In the third and fourth innings, they would get two runners on with one out only to see the next two batters record outs.

“The guys were getting their chances,” Massey said. “We were right where we needed to be. We just couldn’t bring them in. We had the opportunities. It just didn’t happen for us.”

In the top of the fifth, the Chargers padded their lead. An error allowed a run to scored before Brandon Benfield crushed a double to the left field corner to drive in two more runs. Sears was pulled for Jamir Jones-Gatling.  The first batter he faced was McLawhorn who sent an RBI single up the middle to put the Chargers 10 runs over the Hawks and invoking the mercy rule.

For the Hawks, the season ended a lot earlier than they had hoped. Still, coach Massey had great things to say about his team.

“We lost a lot of top players last year and I don’t think too many outsiders gave us much of a chance. We started off slowly, just like we did last year, but we came out very strong as the year went on and came close to taking the conference championship at the end. We had seven seniors who played really hard this season and all of the success we’ve had is because of their efforts. They have left their mark on the proud legacy that is North Lenoir baseball and any success we’ve had this year is because they gave all they had.”

Ayden Grifton 11, North Lenoir 1

                                                                                                                                R             H             E

Chargers              321         14                                                                           11           10           1

Hawks                  100         00                                                                           1              4              3

WP:  Jones

LP:   Howard