Baseball dominates again. One of four teams left

"Right now, we're having fun and playing with energy," SMC head coach Tim Wallace said. "When we do that, good stuff happens."

Good stuff carried over from Tuesday, when the Pioneers put a five-inning whipping on No. 1-ranked Chattahoochee Valley (Alabama), 18-3, despite only four turns at bat. SMC, which lost its opener on Monday against Miami Dade, has scored 28 runs in its last 10 innings.

"It's great," said SMC left fielder Brandon Burris, who had a double and a triple in three trips to the plate. "We're hot when we need to be and we just have to keep carrying this momentum into the next game."

SMC (48-17) plays at 5 p.m. (Eastern) today against Miami Dade, which lost, 10-0, to Iowa Western. With a win there, the Pioneers would advance to Friday's game, which will serve as the championship should Iowa Western prevail against Midland (Texas) tonight.

Should Midland hand Iowa Western its first loss, the championship game of the double-elimination tournament would be held Saturday. Friday's game would essentially become a semifinal pitting one-loss teams against each other — Midland against the SMC-Miami Dade winner. 

Miami Dade beat SMC, 8-3, on Monday in the Pioneers' first game of the tournament that sent them to the losers' bracket.

"This is two years in a row that we'll finish at least in the top four," Wallace said. "We lost in this spot last year and, yeah, we got a third-place trophy that actually goes to both teams that don't make the final, but we don't have to be happy with that. Let's see if we can win this thing. In a championship, if you get there, anything can happen."

The Pioneers batted around in the fourth inning, the third time in the past seven innings they had done that, and scored five runs for a commanding 7-0 lead. With two on and one out, Kennard McDowell and Burris hit back-to-back triples. Wes Rogers followed that with a double off the wall and came around as well.

C.D. Pelham pitched five-plus strong innings to get the win and Taylor Vetzel went the last two without giving up any runs of his own to finish the job. Blinn had just three hits, two of which came in a two-run sixth.

SMC cranked out a dozen hits, including a pair of home runs. Thatcher Coleman hit one in the second inning to get things started, and Rogers knocked one out in the sixth. The Pioneers wrapped up the win two frames early in the seventh when Jordan Garrett (Chesnee) led off with a single, went to third on a hit by Coleman and scored on a walk-off groundout by McDowell.

"Everyone on the team is just doing a great job," Rogers said. "We're all having good at-bats, seeing the ball for a long time and not trying to do too much. When you hit the ball well out here, it goes on its own."

Rogers, Garrett, Burris, McDowell and Zack Shields had two hits each. McDowell, who was the only SMC player without a hit the day before, drove in three. Pelham, who went eight shutout innings as the Pioneers won the NJCAA Eastern District championship game, struck out seven and allowed two hits.

"I came out a little bit nervous," Pelham said. "But after that first pitch, I was ready to go."

Blinn went with freshman left-hander Seth Ballew, who was pulled from the weekend rotation earlier this season for bullpen duty and had not started a game since April 24. He couldn't get through the fifth, allowing 10 hits and eight runs (seven earned) while making 95 pitches.

In the first inning, Blinn's right fielder made a spectacular leaping catch to rob SMC's Matt White, who later had an RBI double, of extra bases. Then Shields lined a two-out single. It was a rare quiet inning for the Pioneers, but one that gave Wallace a good feeling.

"All it takes is somebody to get it started," he said. "I thought it was big when Zack went the other way for a hit in that first inning. I was like, 'OK, we're going to be all over this guy.' "

The Pioneers are starting to see that the first national title in program history is entirely possible.

"We have a chance," Pelham said. "If we play like we've been playing in these last two games, we can leave here with a championship."

JUCO WORLD SERIES

At Grand Junction, Colo. 

Wednesday's games
SMC 10, Blinn (Texas) 2
Iowa Western 10, Miami Dade 0

Today's games
Game 1: SMC vs. Miami Dade, 5 p.m.
Game 2: Midland (Texas) vs. Iowa Western, 9:30 p.m.

Friday's game
Game 1 winner vs. Game 2 winner, 
9 p.m. (will be championship game with Midland loss tonight).

Saturday's game (if necessary)
Championship, 9 p.m. (Midland would need to beat Iowa Western tonight to force game).