Baseball: Pace 4, Navarre 2

Patriots late rally dooms Raiders

Navarre High School's baseball Raiders stranded the tying and winning runs on base Thursday in a 4-2 loss to defending Class 5A champion Pace.

Trailing 4-2 with two outs in the bottom of the seventh, pinch hitter Cale Secondine singled off Patriots' starter Brandon Tyler and went to second on a wild pitch. Gavin Wehby walked and Tyler hit Dusty Jones with a pitch to load the bases before Devante Taylor fouled out to the catcher for the game's last out.

Tyler, a senior, gave up just four hits, walked three, hit three batters and struck out four with his side-arm delivery to earn the seven-inning complete game victory.

Nick Combs pitched two innings in relief and suffered the loss despite not allowing an earned run. A one-out error in the top of the seventh gave Pace runners at the corners. Navarre let Tyler take second before Steven Jernigan, batting for Rusty Way, belted a sacrifice fly to Jacob Terry in right field. Trent Higgenbothem and Tyler tagged and advanced on Terry's throw to third base, which escaped the Raiders' Chris Wheeler, allowing Tyler to score the game's last run.

Brock Secondine pitched five solid innings for the Raiders, allowing one earned run on six hits, two bases-on-balls and two hit batters. He struck out five Pace hitters. The senior worked his way out of a fifth-inning jam when, with one out and runners at second and third, he struck out Way and got Tommy McMillion to ground out to shortstop Kyle Camilli.

Higgenbothem doubled, singled twice and scored the winning run for the Patriots (6-1) in three at-bats and Patrick Ervin was 3-for-4 with a run scored.

Cale Secondine, Wehby, Justin Jordan and Jason Frederick singled for Navarre (4-4, 2-3 in District 1-5A). Combs allowed two hits and didn't walk any batters.

The Raiders play another key district game Friday at Milton. The Panthers beat Navarre 6-2 on Feb. 19 when they scored four two-out runs in the top of the seventh.