Reid Herring pitches a gem as Millbrook downs Heritage baseball

At his best, Millbrook ace Reid Herring was more than Heritage baseball could handle Wednesday night as the Wildcats took a 5-0 win over the Cap-8 Conference rival Huskies.

Millbrook remained undefeated in league play.

Herring (3-1) gave up a leadoff single to Thayer Thomas and sixth-inning double to Channie Renn for the Huskies’ only two hits.

“This was my best start of the season,” Herring said. “My split-finger worked really well and I was able to locate my fastball. This is a big rivalry game, with high intensity.”

Millbrook (9-5, 5-0 Cap-8) scored in the top of the third. Right fielder Tyler Eckert was walked and leadoff hitter and center fielder Tyler Snead beat out a well-placed bunt. Heritage had a throwing error on the play, and it proved to be the only run Millbrook needed.

“We weren’t satisfied with the one run, though,” Millbrook coach Austin James said. “Heritage can swing the bat and you can’t relax against them until the last out.”

The Wildcats added four more runs in the fifth on a triple by Scott McKeon, a hit batsman, singles by Andrew Strickland, Dennis Delgado and Aaron Hodge, and a passed ball.

“We hit our stride, played well over the break,” Heritage coach Joe John said. “But tonight was a shock. We only had five quality at-bats, didn’t work the count, and defensively made mistakes that took us out of the game.”

They said it

“That was an excellent outing for Reid,” James said. “He struggled his last time out, a really uncharacteristic outing. But it’s typical for him to come up big in the big game. And when these two blue and white teams lace ‘em up, it’s a big game.”

Three to know

Reid Herring, Millbrook: Aside from surrendering just two hits, he hit one batter, walked two and struck out eight. He also accounted for two of the Wildcats’ 10 hits.

Andrew Strickland, Millbrook: The senior designated hitter recorded two hits including a key single in the fourth inning through a drawn-in infield that drove in two runs for a 3-0 lead.

Scott McKeon, Millbrook: He had a leadoff triple to start a four-run rally while playing a solid game at shortstop.

Need improvement

Heritage has played well this year, but wasn’t its usual self at the plate or in the field. The good news is more than half of this year’s conference games remain. With so many quality teams in the league, it will be hard for any one team to pull away from the pack, despite Millbrook being blemish-free halfway through.

This story was originally published April 7, 2016 at 1:24 AM with the headline "Reid Herring pitches a gem as Millbrook downs Heritage baseball."