Cape Legion wins 12-5 in zone opener

~ Ford & Sons reached the winners bracket final.

PERRYVILLE -- The Cape Girardeau Ford & Sons Post 63 American Legion baseball team had little trouble in its first zone tournament game since 2003.

Cape rolled past outmanned Herbert Hoover from St. Louis 12-5 Thursday as the five-team, double-elimination Zone 4 tournament got under way at Perryville City Park.

"It's good to get the first one out of the way," Cape's Skylar Cobb said.

Post 63, which this year won its first district title since 2003, improved to 31-13 after a 9-22 campaign last summer.

Cape advances to today's 1 p.m. winners bracket final against defending champion and tournament favorite Festus (29-3), which posted a 4-1 victory over Eureka.

"We know they're a great team, and we'll have to play better than we did today," Cobb said.

Ford & Sons was good enough against a Herbert Hoover squad that was playing its second game of the day, after slipping past host Perryville 12-10 in a 10-inning tournament opener.

Cape took advantage of early wildness by Herbert Hoover pitching to open up a 10-0 lead after three innings.

That cushion allowed Post 63 first-year coach Todd Pennington to clear his bench as all 17 available players saw action.

"We might have relaxed a little bit, but we got the job done," Pennington said.

The big early lead was a welcome sight to Cape pitcher Andrew Williams, who with two years of high school remaining is the team's youngest player.

"It always helps to get early run support," Williams said.

Williams hurled a nine-inning complete game for the first time. High school games are only seven innings, as are regular-season American Legion contests.

"I wanted to go all nine," Williams said. "I didn't get a chance to pitch in district, so it felt great getting a chance to pitch the first game in the zone.

"My first Senior Legion zone game, being the youngest guy on the team, it feels really good."

Williams scattered nine hits and allowed three earned runs. He struck out two and walked four

"My curve was working well today," said Williams, now 5-1.

Pennington could not have asked for more from Williams as Cape was able to save the rest of its pitching staff for what figures to be much tougher games the remainder of the tournament.

"He was great," Pennington said. "We needed him to throw strikes, and that's what he did. He gives us a great outing every time.

"All our pitchers are ready to go now."

Cape's offense was solid if not overwhelming with 10 hits, seven of them coming in the second and third innings when Post 63 broke the game open. Ford & Sons, leading 1-0, scored seven runs in the second and two more in the third.

Ford & Sons also benefited from 11 walks, two hit batters and six stolen bases.

Of Cape's first six runs, four scored on wild pitches and one came home on a walk.

Cobb and Josh Henson both went 2-for-2 with a double. Cobb drove in three runs and Henson added two RBIs.

"We needed to get off to a good start because we didn't play that good the second half of the game," Cobb said.

Cape knows it will face a much stiffer challenge today against Festus, which beat Ford & Sons 7-0 at the Paducah (Ky.) tournament in late June.

Today's winner will advance to Saturday's championship round and have the upper hand on earning a state tournament berth.

"They're a really good team, but we're looking forward to playing them," Pennington said.

Perryville eliminated

For the second straight year serving as tournament host, Perryville was eliminated in two games.

After suffering the 12-10, 10-inning loss to Herbert Hoover, Perryville (3-23) fell to Eureka 10-0 in the last of Thursday's four contests.

Perryville's Paul Ferguson tied the Herbert Hoover game at 9-9 with a solo homer in the bottom of the ninth inning. But Perryville allowed three runs in the top 0f the 10th. Ethan Reiss had three hits for Perryville.

HH 000 030 101 -- 5 9 3

Cape 172 010 10x -- 12 10 5

WP -- Andrew Williams, 5-1. LP -- Marvin Dunn. 2B -- Skylar Cobb (C), Josh Henson (C). Multiple hits -- HH, Brandon Smoot 3-4, Antoine Smith 3-4; Cape, Cobb 2-2, Henson 2-2. Records -- Cape 31-13.