Sports Correspondent
Van Holland
TARBORO —
There was a lot of excitement in the Tarboro Tars Senior Babe Ruth teams dugout Thursday after they defeated Farmville 5-3 Thursday in Coastal Plains League action. The win improves the Tars record to 2-2.
"It was a good team effort," Tars head coach Warren Mitchell said. "We had a couple of bad base running decisions, but we overcame it and fought back and won."
Tarboro has struggled over the past couple of years winning games. The number of players in the program are down due to players going to play legion ball which hurts the Tars with pitching.
"It is always good to get a win," Mitchell said. "Our goal is to be above 500 this year and we are right there at that goal right now with this win. We finished at 500 last season and want to improve that and be above it this year."
Pitching wasn't a problem for Tarboro Thursday though, because Travis Martin and Trey Radford keep the Tars in the game with their performances.
Martin started and gave the team four strong innings of work. After giving up three runs he settled down in the fourth. He also allowed four hits, while striking out one.
Radford relieved Martin and worked the the rest of the game allowing only two hits, one walk and struck out two.
"Travis started for us and had good control and gave us four good innings," Mitchell said. "Trey came in and worked hard as well. He had his curve ball working for him. That pitch through their batters off."
Farmville scored a run in each of the first three innings with two of the runs coming off of errors committed by the Tars infield.
The Tars bounced back in the second inning and scored twice. With the bases loaded, Warren Mitchell, Jr. got a base hit that scored Wesley Hart, then Samuel Flythe singled past the first baseman to score Corey Baker to tie the game at 2-2.
The Tars added three more runs in the fifth. Tyler Harris led off the inning reaching on an error by the Farmville shortstop, then Radford drew a walk. Martin reached base safely after laying down a bunt which allowed Harris to score to score from second. With runners on first and third, Austin Holland hit a deep fly ball to center field which scored Radford to give the Tars a 4-3 lead. Joe Miller then got a base hit and Farmville tried to throw Martin out at third and over threw the third baseman which allowed Martin to score to take a 5-3 lead.
Radford shut down the Farmville hitters in the sixth and seventh innings keeping them off balance with his curve ball to earn the win.
Tarboro will be back in action Monday hosting the Greenville Kiwanis. The game is scheduled to be a double header starting at 6 p.m. at Municipal Stadium.
