Box Score
Hattiesburg, MS-The Belhaven baseball team opened the postseason in fine fashion with a 16-2 win over the University of Mobile Thursday afternoon at Milton Wheeler Field on the campus of William Carey University. The Blazers are now 37-18 on the season with the victory while the Rams fall to 32-22 in 2009.

                       

The game was scoreless through the first two innings as pitchers Brandt Hinton of Belhaven and Nelson Curry of Mobile made it through the first two frames unscathed. The Rams had an opportunity to get on top in the bottom of the first as Hinton put a couple runners on base with walks, but struck out David Cramblitt for the final out of the inning. The last time Cramblitt saw a Belhaven uniform he burned the Blazers with two home runs and 9 RBI's in a 10-5 Mobile victory in Jackson, but went 0 for 3 at the plate Thursday.

 

Belhaven cracked the scoreboard with three runs in the top of the third against Curry to take a 3-0 advantage. Brian McCormick started the inning off with a double off the wall in left, but the base runner was eliminated when courtesy runner Mark Gray was picked off at second. However, Shawn Diehl doubled just inside the bag at third and then scored on Chanse Cooper's double to right field for the first run of the inning. Following a ground out by Lake Eiland, Craig Westcott then drilled what would be the first of three Blazer home runs over the left field fence on a 3-2 pitch to make it a 3-0 game.

 

The Rams trimmed the Blazers lead to two with a run of their own in the bottom of the fourth. Brad Sheffield doubled to put runners at second and third with one out and Cramblitt who had reached on a fielder's choice crossed the plate on an RBI ground out by Scott Mitchell.

 

Belhaven took control of the contest in the fifth when they exploded for seven runs on four hits. With one out, Chanse Cooper walked and moved to second base on a balk by Curry. Eiland was at the plate and appeared to have flied out to center, but the balk was called right before the pitch and he got a new lease on life. Eiland took advantage as on the very next pitch he blasted his fifth homer of the season, which was a two run shot to left putting the Blazers up 5-1.

 

Curry walked two more batters and had runners on the corners when Brent Hudson singled to left chasing home Westcott extending the lead to 6-1. Charlie Edwards brought in the seventh run with a base hit to right plating Foster and at that point Curry's night was finished. Mobile brought in Matthew Brown to pitch and Craig Dean greeted him with a 3 run home run to left on his first pitch to cap off the inning and give the Blazers a commanding 10-1 lead. For Dean, it was his seventh long ball of the season.

 

Mobile added a run in the sixth on a bases loaded single by Nick Laico to cut the Belhaven lead to eight. The Blazers then put the game away for good in the top of the seventh when they struck for six more runs on four additional hits. Belhaven loaded the bases on an error by Dustin Lee, and a pair of walks by relief pitcher Travis Williamson. The first of the six scores came home on a bases loaded walk to Cooper and Eiland pushed across the second run of the frame on a sacrifice fly to right field. Westcott and Foster each followed with RBI singles and the Blazers proceeded to load the bases again with two outs. Kyle Feazell had a pinch hit infield single to drive in a run and McCormick induced a walk with the bases still loaded from Wade Delaneuville to make it a 16-2 contest.

 

In the bottom of the seventh, Hinton had two batters reach but closed the door on the Rams and locked up the 16-2 victory for the Blazers. Hinton worked all seven innings for his seventh win allowing two runs on nine hits with four strikeouts. Curry took the loss going the first 4.1 innings with nine runs allowed on seven hits. Curry walked five and struck out four on the afternoon.

 

The Blazers were led at the plate by Eiland, Westcott, and Dean who each had 3 RBI's in the game. Cooper collected two RBI's while Foster, Edwards, Hudson, Feazell and McCormick had an RBI apiece. McCormick and Westcott led the team in hits with two and Westcott, Dean, and Edwards each blasted home runs for the Blazers. Mitchell and Laico were credited with the only two RBI's for Mobile.

 

Belhaven will take the field again on Friday night at 7 against LSU-Shreveport in round two of the tournament. The Pilots defeated Spring Hill 4-1 in their game on Thursday. Friday's other two contests feature William Carey versus Mobile at 3:30 and Loyola against Spring Hill at Noon. The top seed Crusaders upended Loyola 13-0 in the third game Thursday night.