Cain powers Waxahachie to 4A baseball final

12:42 AM CDT on Thursday, June 5, 2008

By KEITH WHITMIRE / The Dallas Morning News

ROUND ROCK – Colton Cain continues to do the heavy lifting for Waxahachie.

Cain hit a two-run homer and tossed a five-hit shutout to carry Waxahachie to a 6-0 win over Birdville in a Class 4A state semifinal Wednesday at Dell Diamond.

Cain, a left-handed junior, struck out 12, including 10 of the last 14 batters he faced.

"He's pretty good, isn't he?" Waxahachie coach Tracey Wood said. "He's so tough. He kind of symbolizes this whole group. He's just a little more talented than some of the others."

Waxahachie (32-8) advances to meet Corpus Christi Calallen (41-1) in today's 4A state final at 6 p.m. at Dell Diamond. Calallen beat Friends- wood, 7-1, in Wednesday's other 4A semifinal.

Cain showed his strength at the plate in the first inning with an opposite-field home run for a 2-0 lead. Waxahachie scored another run on a groundout by Marshall Davis to make it 3-0 before Birdville took a turn at bat.

An RBI single by Brad Davis scored Derek Junkin from second in the second inning.

Waxahachie got its fifth run in the fifth inning after Cain hit one to the gap in right-center, where the sign reads 407. He scored on a misplayed grounder to short.

With a five-run lead, Cain then showed his strength on the mound in the sixth inning. Birdville was positioned for a rally with its 3, 4 and 5 hitters due up. Cain struck them all out.

Waxahachie's defense got Cain out of jams in the first three innings – including bases-loaded, no-out situations in the first two frames – by turning three straight double plays. Birdville also had runners picked off twice.

"The first few innings, I couldn't find a zone. I was leaving the ball up," Cain said. "I made an adjustment on my curveball, and I was able to control my fastball for strikes."

Birdville (32-11) committed three errors, all of which contributed to runs, in its first state tournament appearance. Starting pitcher Duncan McAlpine allowed seven hits and struck out seven in a complete game.

Birdville stranded seven and couldn't take advantage of five walks issued by Cain.

 

 

State Bound!

The Indians will play Birdville in the State Semi-finals on Wednesday at 7:00pm.

Both 4A Semi-finals and Finals will be played at Dell Diamond in Round Rock.  See links below for more information:

State Tournament Bracket

Dell Diamond

In the other Semi-finals game Corpus Christi Calallen plays Friendswood at 4:00pm.  The winners of the two Semi-finals games play for the 4A Championship on Thursday at 6:00pm.

 

 

Indians defeat Midway for Region 2 Championship!

The Indians win the Region 2 championship in the best of three series, 2 games to 1.  The Tribe won game 1 on Wednesday 7-6 but lost game 2 on Saturday in a pitchers dual 2-1.

In game 3 of the series on Saturday, the Indians took a 9-4 victory behind the bats of Bradley Davis, Colton Cain, Chris Deleon, Drew Harrison and a pitch hit 3 run homer from Hestand Foster. 

Boomer Collins picked up the win on the mound with six strong innings.  Cain relieved the Collins in the seventh to close out a strong hitting Midway team and seal the victory.

 

Champions Day
April 12th will be a special day at Richards Park.  This year the RBI Club will honor two past championship teams, the 1948 District Champs and 1988 State Finalists. The two teams will be introduced and recognized prior to the varsity game.

Other activities that day include the dedication of a historical marker for Richards Park. The park is named after legendary WHS player and MLB player/manager Paul Richards.

Research for the Richards Park project has been conducted by Billy Ray Hancock a member of the 1948 team.  The results of his research have been compiled into a book that will be sold at the game. 

     

 

Who's that calling....
The RBI Club has launched a new service to communicate timely information to the players and parents of all our teams. This tool will allow us to quickly deliver time sensitive information automatically in minutes.

When you received a call from this system the caller id on your phone should display the number 877-565-8456.

The following are tips for retrieving the communication:

• Answer the phone and listen to the message.

• Let the call go to voicemail and retrieve the message from voicemail

• If you miss the call, you can can return the missed call and the message that you missed will be played back.  FYI, anytime you call 877-565-8456 it will replay that last message delivered to your phone, even if it is several days later.

• If the message begins to repeat the same few seconds of the message, just press any key on your phone and the message should start over from the beginning.
  

We recommend that you add the 877-565-8456 to your address book in your phone and name it "RBI Club".