Orange Baseball

This Week’s Orange Panther of the Week is junior pitcher Joey Pounds. Joey earned this award after several strong performances out of the bullpen during the Hilltop Invitational at the beginning of spring. On March 30, Pounds faced New Hanover, currently ranked #2 in the 4A East Region by MaxPreps, and threw a shutout in the 7th inning with one strikeout to keep the Panthers down 2-1 going into the bottom of the frame. Two days later, the Panthers made a long trip to Wilmington to face Ashley, currently ranked #9 in 4A East. Pounds came into the game in relief of starter Cross Clayton and threw a perfect 6th inning with two strikeouts. It allowed Orange to go into the 7th down 4-3. On April 12, Pounds earned his first win of the season against Northwood in Hillsborough. In the eighth inning with the game tied 2-2, Pounds struck out two Chargers. Cross Clayton delivered the game-winning hit in the eighth inning. This season, Pounds came out of the bullpen to throw four-and-two-thirds consecutive scoreless innings. He continues to be a reliable presence for Coach Jason Knapp and has been a valuable presence for an Orange team that captured its first outright regular season championship since 2018. Pounds uncle, Larry Pounds, was a 1991 Orange High graduate and the greatest kickball player in Cameron Park Elementary School history, Orange will return to action in the opening round of the 3A State Playoffs on Tuesday. 

More than any other sport, baseball is the game where the best team doesn’t always win.

Combine that fact and place it within the confines of a single-elimination tournament and its easy to see why there are some unpredictable results this time of year.

After the Orange baseball team ended the regular season with ten straight Central Carolina Conference wins, they faced Person in the conference tournament semifinals. The Panthers probably greeted that news like a puppy getting a new bag of Pupporoni sticks from his owner.

On paper, it was the best matchup possible for Orange. The Panthers routed Person 9-1 in Hillsborough on April 6. Two days later, Orange piled up a season-high 16 hits in a 10-0 rout of the Rockets in Roxboro, the Panthers first run-rule win of the conference season.

Really, Person didn’t have much better fortune hitting the ball in the conference semifinals on Tuesday night in Hillsborough. They also didn’t make big mistakes.

A emotionally charged Rockets team, despite not getting its first batter on base until the fifth inning, stunned the Panthers 4-0 to advance to the CCC Tournament Championship game. Person (11-13), just 24 hours removed from a 10-inning marathon against Eastern Alamance, will travel to Northwood on Thursday night for the tournament title.

It was another big surprise in a tournament that has been filled with them. On Monday, 7th-seeded Walter Williams upset 2nd-seeded Cedar Ridge 6-1 in Hillsborough.

The Rockets got a tremendous performance from sophomore Dylan England, who came into the tournament without a win on the season. On Tuesday, he earned his second victory in two nights. England closed out the Eastern Alamance win by throwing two-and-a-thirds inning of relief.

On Tuesday, England replaced starter Keegan Holmes in the third inning and threw five shutout innings, allowing only one hit.

Orange (16-8)suffered its first loss against a Central Carolina Conference team since March 18, when they felt to Western Alamance.

“That’s baseball,” Orange coach Jason Knapp, looking dejected, said afterwards. “Person was more emotionally ready than we were. They’re playing for the #2 seed and a spot in the (state) playoffs. They definitely had more motivation and more energy than we did tonight. That falls squarely on me. I have to have us ready to go and more prepared. I didn’t do a good job of that tonight.”

Going into the fifth inning, the big question in some Orange fan’s minds wasn’t “Will we win?” It was “Can Ryan Hench throw a perfect game?”

Hench, in his 11th start of the year, retired the first 12 Rockets he faced, none of whom were particularly close to getting on base. In the fifth, Hench stretched that streak to 14 straight after a gorgeous diving stop by shortstop Jackson Berini, who threw out Person Tyler White.

With two out in the inning, Berini made another diving stop on a grounder hit by Person’s Bryce Thaxton and appeared set to end the inning. The throw pulled Orange first baseman Codey Snipes slightly off the bag. Snipes appeared to have got his foot back on to retire Thaxton, but dropped the ball in the process.

That set off a firestorm. After Holmes and Drew Mangum each drew walks, Jamie Martinez sent a pop-up to shallow left field that fell down amidst three Panther fielders. Thaxton and Mangum scored and Person, who had one run in 17 innings against Orange in the regular season, led 2-0.

A.J. Terrell replaced Martinez as a pinch-runner at first base, leading to Person executing a gorgeous double steal where Holmes slid under the tag of catcher Davis Horton at home plate. England lined a single to left field to bring in Terrell.

Hench went from being seven outs away from a perfect game to suffering his second loss of the season.

Orange’s offense, which was limited to three hits in a 2-1 win in eight innings over Eastern Alamance on Friday night, was held to two hits against the Rockets. The Panthers had some threats early. In the first inning, David Waitt reached on a fielder’s choice and Hench got onboard off an error. Bradley turned a 1-6-3 double play to wrap up the inning.

In the third, Jackson Berini drew a leadoff walk and Waitt lined a single to left field, which led to England being installed as pitcher by head coach Kyle Boyette. Hench was hit by a pitch to load the bases, but England got out of the jam after a strikeout, followed by a 4-6-3 double play triggered by Thaxton.

Orange left seven men on base.

The Panthers, which will still be the #1 seed from the Central Carolina Conference going into the 3A State Tournament, will resume play on Tuesday in the opening round of the state playoffs. The Panthers haven’t won a postseason game since 2018, when they upset Jacksonville.

The Orange baseball team won its final regular season home game on Thursday night. The Panthers defeated Eastern Alamance 2-0 behind Ryan Hench’s production in the field and at the plate. Hench drove in Orange’s opening run on a base hit down the third base line, scoring Jackson Berini. In the fifth inning, Hench added a solo homer. It was his fourth of the season, which leads the team. On the mound, Hench struck out ten for his fourth win of the season. In the seventh inning, Connor Funk came in from centerfield and earned his second save of the season. Funk struck out two of the three batters he faced. After Eastern Alamance mounted threats in the first and third innings, the Orange defense retired 12 of the final 13 Eagles. The Panthers are now 15-7 overall, 10-1 in the Central Carolina Conference. Orange will travel to Mebane to face the Eagles on Friday night, which will conclude the regular season. The Panthers will then prepare for the Central Carolina Conference Tournament. Orange, the champions of the CCC regular season, will be the top-seed in the conference tournament and will receive a bye into the semifinals. Orange will start play in the tournament on Tuesday night in Hillsborough.

It would have been memorable enough if the Orange baseball team had simply beaten its crosstown rival Cedar Ridge on Thursday night.

A victory would sew up the Central Carolina Conference regular season championship. It would be Orange’s seventh straight win, its longest streak in six years. They would ensure the top seed for the Central Carolina Conference Tournament starting May 2.

It was a game Orange’s coaching staff expected to win, but there’s seldom a time when high expectations result in something even greater happening.

The perfect end to Orange’s chase for the regular season championship came in the form of a 5-inning perfect game delivered by a sophomore who played on the junior varsity team a year ago.

Cross Clayton retired all 15 of the Red Wolves that came up to bat in order on just 42 pitches for his team-leading sixth win of the season. The Panthers (14-6 overall, 9-1 in the CCC) had a season-high 18 hits in a 16-0 rout of the Red Wolves in front of a packed Orange Baseball Field Thursday night.

Orange wrapped up the regular season championship with two league games to spare. It’s the second straight conference title for the Panthers, who tied Northern Durham for the Big 8 Championship in 2021 amidst an unusual format dictated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

It was the final CCC game of the regular season for Cedar Ridge, who fell to third place in the conference at 7-5. The Red Wolves (12-8, 7-5) now find themselves in the unaccustomed position of rooting for Orange next week. If the Panthers beat Eastern Alamance once in their two-game series, the Red Wolves will receive the #2 seed in the CCC, which includes an automatic spot in the state playoffs.

As soon as Clayton struck out Garrett Ray for the final out, he was swarmed on the mound by his teammates, who couldn’t quite tackle Clayton for a team pile-up, but did administer a quality Gatorade shower.

Perhaps there was something in the air, but the last Panther who had a perfect game was Bryse Wilson, who retired 21 straight batters against Eastern Wayne in the opening round of the 3A State Playoffs on May 10, 2016. As Clayton completed his perfect game in Hillsborough on Thursday, Wilson started in Wrigley Field for the Pittsburgh Pirates against the Chicago Cubs, which ended in a 3-2 Pirates win.

Whether the official NCHSAA record books count Clayton’s performance as a perfect game because it went only five innings due to the run-rule was irrelevant to Orange coach Jason Knapp.

“In my book, that was a perfect game,” Knapp said. “We got it done with the sticks to score 16 runs, so I think that was a perfect game in anybody’s book.”

Clayton’s emergence from a middle reliever in early March to three consecutive complete game shutouts against Person, Northwood and Cedar Ridge is the backbone of Orange’s rise to the CCC championship. As a freshman, Clayton went 2-0 on the junior varsity squad with a 2.29 ERA.

Clayton started Orange’s chase to the CCC Regular Season championship, so he may as well have been the one who ended it. On a fiery night on March 15 in Elon, Clayton replaced starter Ryan Hench in a scoreless game against Western Alamance in the sixth inning and held the Warriors within a run. Orange shortstop Jackson Berini stole home in the 7th for the game’s only run where the tension was thick and the tempers were short on the field, in the stands, even in the press box.

After Orange dropped the rematch against Western Alamance the following Friday, followed by a dour performance against Perquimans in Wilson the next day, Knapp made Clayton the #2 starter for late-week games. The Panthers haven’t lost a conference game since.

“We put him in a tough situation in Western Alamance and he got through it,” Knapp said. “He got the win. From that point on, as a staff, we just thought he was our #2 arm. He’s a pitcher. He commands his stuff with an array of pitches and his efficiency the past month has been unbelievable. He’s got confidence in the guys’ playing behind him.”

After Clayton retired the Red Wolves on just eight pitches in the first inning, Berini lined a double to right field in the bottom of the first. Ryan Hench followed with another double that bounced off the top of the left field fence to score Berini for the game’s opening run. Designated hitter Connor Nordan lined a sacrifice fly to Mason Cates to bring in Hench and increase Orange’s lead to 2-0.

Nordan, who had five RBI’s on Tuesday at Cedar Ridge, went 7-for-8 with eight RBIs in the two-game series.

Berini set the tone for Orange defense in the second inning when he made all three outs on throws to first base, any of which could have gone for a hit on another day. Berini sprinted to the dugout after the third out and slapped gloves with all of his teammates on the bench as Orange’s emotion vaulted into the next level.

The Panthers added five runs in the second inning, sending ten batters to the plate. Cameron Guentensebger, Connor Funk and Codey Snipes all had infield singles to load the bases. Neo Best, in only his fifth start of the year, lined an RBI single over the head of the third baseman into left field. Catcher Davis Horton delivered a double down the right field line and Orange led 7-0 at the end of the second.

The Panthers added nine more runs in the fourth inning. Hench scored twice in the frame. After a double to right field, Nordan knocked Hench in with a single to left field. Later in the inning, which included 14 batters coming to the plate, Hench smoked a three-run homer to left field.

Now that they’ve secured the #1 seed for the Central Carolina Conference Tournament, the Panthers will receive a bye into the semifinals. They will play on Wednesday, May 4 against an opponent to be determined. Orange will face Southern Lee on Saturday at noon in Hillsborough before hosting Eastern Alamance on Tuesday, also at home.

Cedar Ridge will play two nonconference games next week. They face Southwest Guilford on Wednesday in High Point, followed by a trip to Bartlett Yancey on Thursday to conclude the regular season. The Red Wolves are guaranteed to host a game in the CCC Tournament, the first postseason contest at Red Wolves Territory since 2018.

There were many reasons to celebrate for the Orange baseball team on Thursday night. For starters, the closed out their first outright conference championship since 2016 in the most complete way imaginable. Sophomore Cross Clayton threw a 5-inning perfect game, retiring all 15 Cedar Ridge Red Wolves he faces on just 42 pitches as Orange defeated its crosstown rival, Cedar Ridge, 16-0 at Orange High Field. Clayton has now tossed 18 consecutive scoreless innings and has a team-high six wins in his first year at the varsity level. He became the first Orange player to toss a perfect game since Bryse Wilson in the opening round of the 3A State Playoffs against Eastern Wayne on May 10, 2016. As fate would have it, while Clayton threw his perfect game, Wilson was the starting pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates inside Wrigley Field, where the Bucs defeated the Chicago Cubs 4-3. Junior shortstop Jackson Berini scored Orange’s first run after he led off with a double to right field. Berini finished 2-for-2 with two RBIs. Orange has won seven in a row and will resume action on Saturday against Southern Lee in Hillsborough. First pitch will be at noon.