By By KEVIN TRAVIS, Sports Editor
YEATESVILLE — Once the bats heated up, there was no cooling them off. The Northside Panthers put up an eight-spot in the fifth inning, leading the hosts to a 12-2, five-inning win over the Mattamuskeet Lakers in Friday’s Northside Easter Baseball Tournament.
The Panthers will play for the tournament title at 7:30 p.m. today.
“We’re going to have to be at the top of our game,” Northside coach Keith Boyd said. “We’ll just do the best we can. It’s exciting to be in it.”
Mattamuskeet, which got a pair of hits from Shane Cuthrell, took a 2-0 lead in the top of the third. That’s all the Lakers would get off starter Tyler Woolard and reliever Taylor Woolard.
Tyler Woolard, who got the win, pitched 2 2/3 innings. Taylor Woolard finished off the Lakers in the final 2 1/3 innings of the game.
“We started off kind of slow,” Boyd said. “We still have to work on our pitching. We had too many walks, but we had some guys up there who hadn’t thrown a whole lot.”
Northside (4-9) took the lead for good with four runs in the bottom of the third.
The Panthers put the game away with the eight-run fifth.
“I thought our hitting came around those last couple innings,” Boyd said. “That was nice to see because that’s one of the things we hadn’t been doing really well.”
Seven different players collected at least one hit for the Panthers. Justin Boyd (2-2), Brandon Ussery (2-3, 2 runs) and Tyler Waters (2-3) each banged out two hits.
Josh Miller (1-2), Brandon Marsh (1-2), Grey Burbage (1-3) and Taylor Woolard (1-3, 2 runs) had one hit apiece.
“We spread it around,” Boyd said. “I think the bottom of the lineup did fairly well. We’re just hoping to get it rolling.”
Nic Cuthrell (1-2) and Richard Williams (1-3) each had a hit for the Lakers, who play in the consolation game at 5 p.m. today.