An old adage in baseball is that hitting is contagious. If that is true, Mitchell Curry’s Wildcats are in the throws of a full blown epidemic. Richmond Hill has 53 hits and 40 runs in the last three games. One of those games was a loss, but the latest victims of this outbreak were Johnson High School that lost in a rain make up on Friday 17-0 in four innings and a 14-0 thrashing of Bradwell on Saturday that lasted only five innings.
When the runs come, they have been coming in bunches.
Against Johnson, the Wildcats opened the game with six straight hits and scored six runs, and they scored seven runs in the third inning with four consecutive hits.
The leaders of that hit parade were Cameron Corbin 2-3 with a triple, Scott Strickland 2-3 and 2 RBIs, Nathan Kilburn 2-2, 2 2B and 2 RBIs, Matt Schlag 2-3 and 2 RBI’s, Jeremy Goolsby 2-4 and 4 RBI’s, and Aaron Pittsley 2-2 with an RBI. Alex Tucker, in his first start of the season, was the recipient of his team mates’ graces but hardly needed it.
The Richmond Hill junior collected five strikeouts in the complete game shutout and gave up only one hit while walking three, demonstrating that the Wildcat bullpen has done their fair share this early season as well.
Although good pitching is always appreciative of good hitting, there are probably a few on the staff secretly harboring wishes for saving some of the offensive outpouring for when their region games start. The Wildcats improved to 5-1 by weeks end and have four more non-region games before hosting their first region contest - a game everyone in Richmond Hill has circled on their calendar: South Effingham, March 23.
First Richmond Hill will host Johnson High School tomorrow at 5:30 p.m., then travel to Jenkins High School on Friday, March 16 for a 4:30 p.m. start.
Against Bradwell this past Saturday it was more of the same.
Richmond Hill’s five-run first inning against the Tigers was fueled by another 2 RBI double off the bat of Wildcat catcher Nathan Kilburn. Nick, named "Hotdog" Kilburn, might consider a new moniker - "Deuce".
Kilburn would stroke another 2 RBI double in the fourth inning, his seventh double in six games this season, not including two doubles he hit in the Wildcats pre-season game.
He isn’t the only one putting up some lofty early numbers, lately it has been pretty much the whole team.
Although Coach Curry would be the first one to say that this is how his team is supposed to perform when playing teams that do not have the roster to match up with the Wildcats, even the coaching staff has to be in awe of some of the numbers being put up lately.
Cameron Corbin got the start against Bradwell and pitched four innings while striking out four and giving up only three hits.
It was the Richmond Hill senior’s second win against no losses this season. Junior reliever Ben Auger pitched a scoreless fifth inning to complete the shut-out - the Wildcats third so far.
An eight run fourth inning put an end to any thought Bradwell had of mounting a comeback and put an exclamation point to the end of Richmond Hill’s week. Hitting leaders for the day were: Kilburn 3-3, 2B, 4 RBIs; Jeff Yeager 3-3, 2 2B, 3 RBI’s; Josh Futch 2-2 RBI; Jeremy Goolsby 1-2, 2B, 2 RBIs.
The Cats played last night against Savannah Christian, but results were not available as of press time. Next up is Thursday home rematch with Johnson, 5:30 p.m. start.