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By Jon Smythe
Athletic Director
Spring Sports means balls, bats, tracks and soccer nets, but it also means weather. Spring weather is unpredictable and often unfriendly for games that are best played and enjoyed on warmer and dry days. Nevertheless, the spring season kicked off last week with most of our spring teams in action.
Baseball
The boys of summer donned their mock-T’s and battled cool temperatures and the Panthers from Page County High School in a traditional, pre-District early season contest. The varsity team traveled to Page County for their first game on Monday, March 19.
Junior Chris Brown started the season opener for Coach Donn Hackney’s Panthers and pitched 5 and 1/3 innings before being relieved late in the game. He would suffer the loss, losing 14 to 7. Brown allowed 12 hits while striking out 7 and walking 6.
Junior Jeff Ritenour delivered a fourth inning triple with the bases loaded to bring the score within one, but the Rapp side couldn’t stay close. Senior Mark Wharton was 1 for 2 at the plate and scored twice for RCHS. Sophomores Doug White and Darryl Cropp Jr. each collected two hits to lead the offense.
“It was real obvious we had first game jitters,” said Coach Hackney. “We are a young team and the kids are going to have to learn to compete very quickly. There were some bright spots. I was particularly impressed with freshman catcher Josh Werner who was brought up to play in this game because of the absence of Jesse Smith on the senior trip.”
The Junior Varsity played at home under sunny skies and cool temperatures. The wind made it seem cold and the eight errors that the JV Panthers gave up made it seem even colder. Sophomore Noah Starks went the distance for Head Coach Mike Tupper’s squad and suffered the loss. He only walked three, but the eight errors and nine Page County hits were enough to spoil the team’s home opener on the new fields by the final score of 12 to 2.
Later in the week, on Friday, March 23, the varsity lost to the weatherman and had their game cancelled due to the wet field conditions here against George Mason High School. The Junior Varsity traveled to George Mason however and managed to play the JV Mustangs from GM. Noah Starks and freshman Josh Werner combined to handcuff the Mustang batters and the JV went home with their first season victory 5- 3.
The Lady Panthers that traveled with the Varsity Baseball team to Page County on March 19 had a somewhat better start to their season. Behind the strong pitching of sophomore Rachel Sharp and Junior Gwen Johnson, the Varsity girls defeated the
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