Harmony sent 15 men to the plate in the fourth inning and scored nine runs Friday, and held on to earn a 12-9 road win over Osceola.
The win gave the Longhorns (9-9) a three-game regular season sweep over the Kowboys. Still, Harmony found itself more than 30 spots below the Kowboys in the official FHSAA rankings this week – which will be used to determine seeds and home field advantage in the upcoming Class 7A District 9 tournament.
“We’re obviously pleased to get the sweep against a county rival and a really good baseball team,” Harmony coach Heath Williams said. “The rankings are what they are and we still have two weeks and seven regular-season games left. If are close at the end of the season, we obviously would hope head-to-head would figure into the rankings as we would love to get home field advantage for districts. That said, it is way too early for us to worry about computer rankings.”
The game looked to be a pitching duel early as Osceola’s Michelangelo Cruz retired eight of the first nine batters. But that changed in the third inning. Yathaniel Matos ripped a two-out single and Nate O'Neill would walk. Castillo followed with a two-run double and scored on Jhon Peralta’s RBI single as Harmony grabbed a 3-0 lead.
After the Kowboys cut the lead to 3-1 on Jason Ramos’ RBI single; the Longhorns broke the game open in the fourth. After loading the bases with one out, a bunt single by Hunter Bola – the third consecutive bunt single executed by the Longhorns -- brought in the first run of the inning. Four hits, including Castillo’s two-run RBI single, a walk and a pair of wild pitches brought in seven more runs as Harmony built a 12-1 lead.
Osceola managed one run in the fifth to make it 12-2 but were faced with a possible “mercy rule” ending in the bottom of the fifth. But Osceola countered with a big inning of their own – sending 11 players to the plate and scoring six runs on just two hits. The Kowboys took advantage of an error and five to cut the gap to 12-8.
A John Rodriguez walk, a wild pitch and two groundouts resulted in another Kowboys run in the bottom of the sixth as Osceola made it 12-9. They threatened in the bottom of seventh – sending the tying run to the plate when Alejandro Pereira and Terry Cruz opened the inning with back-to-back singles. But with two on and no out, Nick Palmi’s hot shot down the third base line was snagged out of the air by freshman Angel Medina, who ended up doubling Pereira off second. Pitcher Ismael Rivera then struck out Ramos to end the game.
“It was a strange inning, Cruz was pitching to contact and getting outs. I am not sure whether he just lost his location or what, but they just started hitting him hard,” Osceola coach Scott Birchler said. “I am proud of the way we fought back and we were able to get the potential tying run to the plate. Unfortunately for us, their third baseman made a great play on a ball that Nick scorched and that was pretty much the game.”
For Williams, it was another positive step forward for his young team that was playing without several injured regulars – including top hitter Cade Walter.
“Castillo is a sophomore and has really picked us up lately with his bat, Rivera is another sophomore who finished out the game on the mound and then we have a freshman in Medina make the play of the game,” Williams said. “For a young team, we are doing a lot of things right. We’re hitting well, moving runners over and making big plays on defense.”
Harmony banged out 12 hits. In addition to the big night from Castillo, Scarborough, Santiago and Matos had two hits each. John Rodriguez had two hits and scored two runs for the Kowboys.
Harmony has a busy week coming up with a home game Tuesday against Eau Gallie and road games against county rivals Tohopekaliga (Thurs.) and St. Cloud (Fri.). Osceola (10-8) plays Liberty at home on Wednesday before traveling to Palm Harbor next Friday.
