The Brownwood Lions have shown glimpses of promise since their last outing at Morris Southall Field, winning four of the last 10 contests after a 1-4 start to the season, but the No. 23 Gatesville Hornets were too much to overcome in a 15-2 home loss Tuesday night.
“Hats off to Gatesville,” said Lions first-year head coach Chris Bright. “They’re a ranked team in 4A, they’re senior-loaded and they’ve got guys that can swing the bat and pitch it well, and they back it up in the field. We have gotten better but we ran into a buzz saw tonight and killed ourselves in spots where we could have gotten out of innings and didn’t do it. Some balls left the yard and some balls found gaps even when they weren’t hit very hard, but that’s just the way baseball is sometimes.”
Gatesville (13-5) scored in all six innings, and tallied at least two runs in five of those frames. The Lions (5-11), meanwhile, scratched across their runs in the bottom of the fourth inning.
Trailing 9-0, Brownwood started its half of the fourth with a walk by Harrison Sweaney, then a single by Shaxton Simpson. With one out, Carter Massey singled to right field to plate Sweaney. Later in the frame, an errant pick-off attempt by the catcher at first base allowed Simpson to score the second run all the way from second base.
The Lions finished with six hits – two by Simpson and one each from Wyatt Wolf, Garrett Wilkerson, Daylyn Ansons, and Massey.
“I like the way some of the guys are swinging the bat, Shaxton Simpson swung it really well tonight,” Bright said.
On the mound, Logan Flores got the start and yielded eight earned runs on nine hits – including a pair of home runs – while striking out three and walking one. Massey tossed two innings of relief and gave up a run on one hit with three strikeouts and two walks. Ansons worked the final inning for the Lions and yielded two earned runs on five hits with a pair of walks and no strikeouts.
“I thought that our pitchers pitched well when they pitched down,” Bright said. “I told Logan whenever he was up he got hit hard, and some thing for the other guys. When they pitched up they got hit hard, but when they pitched down they got outs, they got weak contact.”
Defensively, the Lions were charged with three errors, which aided in four earned runs for Gatesville.
Brownwood wraps up its pre-district slate at noon Saturday against Abilene High, then begins its District 6-4A schedule at home against Stephenville at 7 p.m. Tuesday.
“I hope this schedule we’ve played helps us immensely for district,” Bright said. “We’ve played up, nothing but 5A and 6A teams for the most part. We’ve seen really good pitching, pretty good defense and guys that could swing the bat. That’s going to reflect a lot of what our district is going to look like, and I hope we’ve learned a lot and will step up to the task of playing quality baseball.”
