Balanced offensive attack carries Kennett baseball past Greene County Tech (Ark.) 13-6

Photo by Dustin Ward, staff
Kennett’s Marshall Brown celebrates hitting a solo home run in the top of the second inning against Greene County Tech Thursday afternoon in Paragould, Arkansas.

KENNETT, Mo. - From top to bottom the Kennett Indians lineup is a force to be reckoned with this spring.

That trend continued when the Kennett baseball team traveled to Arkansas to take on Greene County Tech Thursday afternoon.

Eight of the Indians batters drove home at least one run and six batters recorded multiple hits as Kennett hammered its way past host Greene County Tech 13-6.

Photo by Dustin Ward, staff
Kennett’s J.T. Williams celebrates hitting a two-run homer in the top of the sixth inning against Greene County Tech Thursday afternoon at Paragould, Arkansas. Williams finished with a team-high five RBIs.

“We are capable of getting contributions from a lot of people in our lineup,” Kennett coach Andrew New said. “We’ve got a good balance of right-handed and left-handed hitters. We’ve got guys up and down our lineup that can deliver an extra-base hit. If we can keep guys going in the right direction we really like our offense.”

Greene County Tech (7-7) jumped out to an early 1-0 lead when No. 3 hitter Cade Cancilla, who finished 3 for 4 with a team-high four RBIs, delivered an RBI double in the bottom of the first inning.

Kennett responded with three runs in the top of the third inning and another run in the top of the fourth inning to move ahead 4-1.

Greene County Tech narrowed the margin to 4-3 when cleanup hitter Cody Miller collected a 2 RBI double in the bottom of the fifth inning.

Kennett added nine runs over the final two innings it batted to pad its lead to 13-3 by the end of the top of the seventh inning before Cancilla hit a three-run homer in the bottom of the seventh inning to set the final score.

“We really swung the bats well the last two innings,” New said. “We also swung the bats well early in the game. Then in the middle innings, we were a little sluggish but we really responded well again at the end.”

No. 9 hitter J.T. Williams recorded a team-high five RBIs for Kennett. Williams had an RBI single in the second inning, hit a two-run homer in the sixth inning, and collected a 2 RBI single in the seventh frame.

Leadoff hitter Seth Tice finished 4 for 4. Tice plated a run when he collected a sacrifice fly in the top of the second inning.

Kennett No. 6 hitter Marshall Brown finished 3 for 5 with a solo home run. Cleanup hitter Andrew Spence was 2 for 5 with an RBI single and No. 5 hitter Kobe Gates finished 2 for 3 with an RBI double. No. 3 hitter Reese Robinett and No. 7 hitter Body Ellis also each drove home a run with a sacrifice fly.

Ellis collected the victory for Kennett on the hill. He allowed three earned runs, six hits, struck out seven, and walked two in a 78-pitch five-inning performance.

Gates pitched the final two innings for Kennett. He allowed three earned runs, three hits, struck out three, and walked one while throwing 37 pitches.

“Today was a better outing for Bodey,” New said. “He kind of got off to a slow start this year on the mound. The last couple times he’s been out there he’s starting to get a little bit better. His performance today was really promising and hopefully, he can continue to pitch well going forward.”

Three of the five pitchers Greene County Tech used allowed at least three runs.

Kennett (10-3) is back in action Friday at 4:45 p.m. when it plays Harding Academy (14-6) at Search, Arkansas.

“It’s going to be a tough game,” New said. “They are the defending state champs. We went down there last year and was able to win. We will have our third tough game in three days Friday so we will see how we compete.”

Kennett 13, Greene County Tech 6

KHS 031 003 6 - 13 16 1

GCT 100 020 3 - 6 8 0

W - Bodey Ellis. L - Layne Phillips. HR - Marshall Brown (K), J.T. Williams (K), Cade Cancilla (GC). 2B - Brown (K), Kobe Gates (K), Seth Tice 3 (K), Tanner Duncan (K), Cancilla (GC), Cody Miller (GC). Multiple hits - Kennett: Seth Tice 4-4, Andrew Spence 2-5, Gates, 2-3, Brown 3-5, Duncan 2-3, Williams 3-4; Greene County Tech: Nate Crider 2-4, Cancilla 3-3.