Oak Ridge baseball team pounds Charleston in 5 innings

OAK RIDGE -- When Oak Ridge baseball coach Patrick Friga found out that a meeting with lauded Charleston might be added to his team's schedule, he had a question for ace Brett Thomas.

"Friga said, 'Hey, we might schedule Charleston. You want them?'" Thomas said. "I said, 'Yes, of course. Why wouldn't you want to face the best teams and try to prove yourself as a player and as a team?'"

Thomas and the Oak Ridge offense proved better Tuesday by run-ruling Charleston 12-2 in five innings.

"I can't say enough about the Brett Thomas kid -- what a tremendous young athlete," Charleston coach Michael Minner said. "You know, the sky's the limit for him and he's a wonderful kid -- a competitor. When we come up here, we wanted to see Brett, and we wanted to see how we stacked up early in the year."

Charleston's offense fared well in the first inning, getting three hits off Thomas and scoring two earned runs on an RBI double by Danny McKinney and an RBI single by Michael Baugh.

"They came out ready to hit, and I didn't come out ready to pitch," Thomas said. "They jumped on straight fastballs. I figured I could just blow it by them and against a good team like Charleston, they're going to hit a good fastball that's down the middle and up. I wasn't pitching. I was just throwing, and they torched me there that first inning."

Oak Ridge (3-2) led off the bottom of the first with three consecutive hits off Charleston starter Ethan Browning and scored three runs to take a lead it never gave back.

"That was big," Friga said. "Most teams could lay down like that, and we wanted to come back, give our ace a chance to win."

Thomas recorded eight of the nine outs over the second, third and fourth innings with strikeouts but had to strand five batters in the process.

He yielded to Lance Rohde with one out and two runners on in the fifth inning after reaching his predetermined pitch count.

Rohde walked the first batter he faced to load the bases before recording back-to-back strikeouts to end the threat.

Oak Ridge padded its lead with three more runs in the second when Thomas sent a 3-1 pitch from Browning well over the center-field fence.

"It was actually 3-0 and I had the green light and I should have killed it and I missed it," said Thomas, who sent the 3-0 pitch scorching foul down the third-base line. "I didn't think he'd go back in there, but he threw the exact same pitch, and I just put a good cut on it."

Thomas finished the day 3 for 3 with four RBIs. He was walked intentionally in his team's five-run fifth inning and scored four times.

"We discussed it, but it's early in the year, it's early in the game and it's one of those situations where that was probably the turning point in the game," Minner said when asked if he considered walking Thomas in the second inning. "After he took the 3-0 pitch and hammers it down the line, yeah we probably should have put him on, but it's one of those things that I want to see what my kids can do."

Oak Ridge center fielder Jacob Light was 3 for 4 with three runs scored while senior Cody Myers was 2 for 3 with three RBIs.

Charleston 200 00 -- 2 6 0

Oak Ridge 330 15 -- 12 10 1

WP -- Brett Thomas (2-0). LP -- Ethan Browning (0-1). HR -- Thomas (OR). 2B -- Danny McKinney (C), Jacob Light (OR), Cody Myers (OR), Lance Rohde (OR), Multiple hits -- Charleston: McKinney 3-3; Oak Ridge: Light 3-4, Thomas 3-3, Myers 2-3.