Knights Top Hopewell, Comeback Falls Short against Creekview

For the 2nd Year in a Row, The Marietta Knights traded in their normal jerseys to honor the
United States Military on Memorial Day weekend. Thank you Veterans!

It was another up and down day for the Marietta Knights at the Memorial Day Classic at Dwight Terry Park in Ball Ground, Georgia. The Knights opened the day against their rival the Hopewell Hawks for the second time in 2 weeks and they knew to expect another tight game. Trailing 1-0 in the bottom of the 2nd, Luke Martin came up with the big hit the Knights needed. With Gil Hastings and George Krivsky on 1st and 2nd, Luke ripped a line drive right over the 3rd base bag. Chalk flew as the ball hit the line and screamed all the way to the LF fence for a 2 run double. Luke scored on Nathan Brooks' ground out to SS and the Knights held a 3-1 lead. Luke was hit by a pitch in his next at bat and scored on an error. Hunter Williamson's RBI triple in the 5th scored Jackson Tysinger from 2nd to complete the Knights' scoring at 5.

Cody Hahn earned the win against Hopewell with 4 K's
in 5 innings on the mound.

Cody Hahn had a great day on the mound and controlled the game for the Knights. Cody only allowed 1 ER and struck out 4 in 5 innings of work. Luke added to his Player of the Game credentials with the Defensive Play of the Game, a textbook throwout to catch a Hawk trying to steal 3B. Austin Hansell came on in the 6th and picked up the save. Luke had 2 RBI's and 2 runs scored and Hunter was 2 for 3 with a triple and an RBI in the 5-3 win.

Marietta would follow that win with 2 games against the host Creekview Grizzlies. As good as the defense was in the win against Hopewell, it was that bad against Creekview. In game 1 Creekview pulled away for a 10-4 win with help from 7 Marietta errors. Jack Vargo was 2 for 3 with a 2B and RBI and Nathan Brooks added a 2B and an RBI. It went from bad to worse in the 2nd Creekview game as poor defense and base running saw Creekview take a 14-2 lead into the final inning. But rather than accept an embarrassing defeat, the Knights fought hard and refused to give up. Cody's ground out scored Garrett Wells to make it 14-3 with 2 outs. From there, Jack, Gil, Hunter, George, Jackson, Luke and Austin put together 7 straight 2 out hits. After Garrett walked, Nathan picked up a 2 run single, his 2nd hit of the inning, to cut the lead to 14-11. The Grizzlies finally made the final out and escaped with an improbably close win. The Knights overall play was disappointing, but their great show of character in refusing to throw in the towel was certainly something for the team to build on for the future.

The Knights to try to stay in the shade between games.

Titans Walk Off Hit Knocks Knights from AYBA Tourney

It was a tough road for the Marietta Knights in the AYBA Open Tournament in Alpharetta. After opening with a 1 run win over Hopewell, the Knights lost to the Georgia Stars and the WPB Braves to set up a bracket game with the host AYBA Titans. Jack Vargo started the game like he usually does with a single and a stolen base and he came home on George Krivsky's single. After Hunter Williamson scored on a an error, Garrett Wells knocked in George and the Knights held a 3-0 lead. AYBA came right back in the bottom of the 1st with 3 doubles and tied the score at 3-3. Jack led off the 2nd with another single and scored on Hunter's RBI double. In the 3rd, Luke Martin reached on an error and scored on an RBI ground out by Nathan Brooks but he Titans pushed 2 across in the bottom of the 3rd to tie it back up at 5-5 lead.

The tight battle continued as the Jackson Tysinger singled and stole 2nd and 3rd. George knocked him in with his 2nd RBI single of the day. But the Titans answered with 2 straight singles in the 5th to score a run. It was 6-6 going into the bottom of the 7th inning. The Titans' leadoff man walked and advanced to 2nd on a ground out. After a pop out to Jackson at SS, the runner took 3rd on a passed ball. With 2 outs, the Titans #3 hitter hit a blast off the RF fence that scored the runner and gave the Titans an exciting 7-6 victory. It was a tough way to lose, the Knights battled the AAA home team to the wire and played good baseball. When you play great teams, great players make plays and that's what the Titans did in the 7th.

   

Knights Open AYBA Tournament with Thrilling 4-3 Comeback Win Against the Hopewell Hawks

The Knights players check out the awesome playing surface from the big league dugouts at Legion Field in Alpharetta.

The Marietta Knights opened up the AYBA Invitational on Wednesday night at beautiful Legion Field in Alpharetta. The park is a throwback to old American Legion Baseball leagues of the 70's and 80's and is newly renovated. The boys were fired up and ready to play upon finding the real dugouts, brick walls and perfectly manicured playing surface. The excitement of the great ballpark soon gave way to the much greater excitement of a tight ballgame where every play would matter against a very strong Hopewell Hawks team.

Legion Field in Alpharetta, Georgia

The Hawks threatened to blow it open early when they put runners on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out in the 1st. Hopewell's cleanup hitter hit a hot shot up the middle but Gil Hastings knocked it down at the mound and threw home to Luke Martin for a tag out at the plate. Gil got the #5 hitter to ground to George Krivsky at 1B for an unassisted third out and no runs scored.

The Hawks used a 2 out rally in the 2nd to take a 2-0 lead and they had runners on 1st and 2nd when Hunter Williamson stabbed a hard grounder at 3rd and touched the bag to end the inning. The Hawks added a run in the 3rd after a leadoff single and a couple of stolen bases allowed them to score on a ground out to 1st. Meanwhile, the Knights left 2 on in the 1st and 1 in the second and went into the bottom of the 3rd trailing 3-0.

C'mon, Let's Go Kiiiiiid!!! 

After a leadoff walk, Alex Beaullieu scored all the way from first on Jack Vargo's massive line drive double that bounced off the deep Legion Park fence. Jack advanced to 3B on a ground out and scored on Hunter's line drive RBI single to right that cut the score to 3-2. Jackson Tysinger was unhittable on the mound as he retired 10 straight Hopewell Hawks from the 3rd thru 5th innings. After cutting the Hawks lead to 3-2 in the 3rd, the Knights left 2 more on in the inning and left men on 2nd and 3rd in the 4th.

Down 3-2 in the bottom of the 5th, Hunter hit his 3rd single of the night. With 2 outs, Hunter used great jumps to steal 2nd and 3rd. As the stress mounted, Luke ripped a burner to deep short. Hopewell's SS backhanded the ball on the edge of the outfield grass and fired towards first but Luke beat the throw and Hunter scored to tie it up at 3-3. It was a huge 2 out RBI single for Luke. Gil came on to run for Luke and stole 2nd to get into scoring position. That brought George to the plate who's been on offensive tear. George hit a rocket over the centerfielder's head. As all 3 outfielders raced toward the wall Gil scored easily and George cruised into 2nd as the Knights dugout, crowd and even George went wild at the 4-3 lead.

The inning ended with 1 minute left on the time clock so the Hawks would get one last chance. After

Rally Cones? Well, they worked.

a popout to George at 1B, they managed a base runner on a HBP. The next batter hit a deep flyball to CF where Nathan Brooks hauled it in for the 2nd out. After the baserunner stole 2nd with 2 outs Jackson reached a full count on the next Hawks batter. Jackson reached back and threw a blazing fastball that hit Luke right in the mitt on the outside edge of the plate. The umpire paused and Luke held the mitt firmly in the same spot until the ump finally threw out his right hand and made the big punch out call. Strike 3. Knights win.

It was a huge opening win in the tournament for Marietta. The Hawks are a great, very well coached team and this was a hard earned victory. Jackson Tysinger picked up the win and only allowed 1 run on 1 hit in 4 innings of work. He walked 1 and struck out 3 in the dominant performance. Jack Vargo was 2 for 3 with 2 doubles, an RBI and a run scored. Hunter Williamson was 3 for 3 with an RBI and a run scored and Luke Martin had the big 2 out RBI single to tie the game. George Krivsky was 2 for 3 and had the game winning hit with his RBI double in the 5th. The Knights have 2 days off and will continue pool play on Saturday at Webb Bridge Park in Alpharetta.

  
     

Speed on the Bases

Coach Brook snapped this pic of one of the locals practicing
with the Knights Thursday evening.

The Knights had a surprise guest at practice Thursday evening. A deer came out of the woods, wandered into the dugout and out onto the field while the boys were practicing. The deer walked right up to the guys and even joined them when they were running poles. The boys were impressed with the deer's speed. Coach Tony, however, was disappointed in the deer's effort and made him run a few extra.

8 Men Out - Knights Win Pool, Play Semifinals with 8 Players at USSSA Tournament in Villa Rica

The Knights Defense Takes the Field

The Marietta Knights turned in a strong 2-0 performance to win their pool at the USSSA Champs Wear the Rings Tournament at the Villa Rica Civic Center on Saturday. On Sunday the Knights took the field with only 8 players due to injury and illness. Even though they fell in the Semifinal, the gutty undermanned performance was one of Coach Rob's proudest moments with the team.

Marietta opened with the very strong Newnan Scorpions. The game remained scoreless after 2 thanks to the Defensive Play of the Game from #7 Austin Hansell. The Scorpions were poised to break the game open early with runners on 2nd and 3rd and one out when their clean-up hitter scorched a line drive down the 3B line. Austin snagged the ball and tagged the bag for a huge double play to end the inning and the threat. The Scorpions finally did jump out to a lead in the 3rd when they put together a couple of walks and couple of hits to build a commanding 4-0 lead. George Krivsky came on to pitch and not only stopped the bleeding but dominated for the next 3 innings. George did not allow a run and struck out 5.

New Acquisition Cody Hahn was great
in 7 1/3 innings on the mound and had
2 RBI's in the tournament.  

The Knights scratched their way back with aggressive base running in the bottom of the 3rd. Jack Vargo singled and scored on Jackson Tysinger's single. Jackson stole 2 bases and scored when Hunter Williamson reached on an error and Hunter stole 2 bases and scored on a passed ball to close the gap to 4-3. In the 4th George tied the game when he singled, stole 2 bases and also scored on a passed ball. With the game still tied in the 5th, Jack singled and stole 2nd to set up another Jackson RBI single and the Knights finally had the lead at 5-4. Austin took the hill in the 6th and looked great in picking up the Save in just 10 pitches.

Next up was a rematch with the Hiram Hornets. After the Knights shut them out a week earlier, the Hornets dugout was on fire when a Sac Fly gave them a 1-0 lead after 1. But the Knights took the momentum back in a big way when 5 straight Knights crossed the plate with hits from Garrett Wells, Nathan Brooks, Luke Martin and a big 2 run single from the newest Knight Cody Hahn. Gil Hastings kept the Hiram bats quiet in 3 solid innings on the mound. Gil struck out 5 to just 1 hit and 2 BB's.

The Knights added a run in the 3rd after Hunter singled and scored on an RBI double by Austin. They blew the game open in the 5th. George hit a 2 run double and scored on a Nathan Brooks double. After Luke singled again, Jack Vargo added a 2 run single to give Marietta an 11-1 lead. Cody closed it out on the mound in his first appearance by striking out 4 in 2 innings and just giving up 1 run. The Knights took the impressive 11-2 win and Pool title.

George Krivsky shut down opponents in
2 outings during the weekend.

The pool win sent the Knights to the Semifinals of the Gold Bracket where competition would step up dramatically with a game against Hooks Baseball. To make it even tougher, the Knights found out just a couple of hours before game time that they would be down to 8 players due to an injury and illness. The coaching staff was amazed at how the team embraced the challenge and set out to give the Hooks everything they had. The Knights plan was to lock down the infield and put Gil and Nathan in the gaps to chase down any balls that made it to the OF. Their play was amazing and behind outstanding pitching from Cody, the Knights somehow trailed only 2-1 after 5 innings. Finally, the Hooks were able to "hit it where they ain't" a few times in the 6th to tack on 4 runs and each team added a run in the 7th for the 7-2 final score. By rule, the Knights had to take an automatic out every time the 9th spot in the order came up to bat. The Knights left 9 men on base in innings where they were forced to take this automatic out.

There were plenty of great defensive efforts to choose from. Cody pitched 5 1/3 innings and only allowed 2 runs in the first 5 even though he only had 2 outfielders. Big Game Hunter had 6 assists and 2 putouts. Luke threw out a runner trying to steal 3rd. With runners on 1st and 2nd, Gil had to run hard from CF to try to make a catch on a shallow pop fly into LF. He didn't quite make it, but the runners had to hold half way and he was able to turn it into an unusual FC by throwing out the base runner at 3rd. In one of the best hustle plays of the year, a Hook hit a hard grounder into LF when the Knights 2 outfielders were shifted to the right. Jackson ranged to his right from SS but couldn't keep it in the IF. He never slowed down and raced after the ball until he caught up to it well into LF where he wheeled around and threw a strike to Hunter who tagged out the batter at 2B trying to get a double. And finally, the Defensive Play of the Day. Nathan covered a ton of ground going from RCF to make a great running catch on a Flyball in RF. The runner on 1st didn't think he could get there and ventured too far off the bag. After Nathan made the catch he threw to George who made a nice stretch and catch for the double play. These 8 guys were amazing in the field.



Nathan Brooks was a beast running down balls from his gap
position when the Knights had to play with 8.

Offensively, Luke went 3 for 3 on the day and Hunter was 2 for 4 with 2 doubles. George and Cody each added an RBI single. The Knights had plenty of base runners, but in the end they were beaten by the only thing that their great effort and desire could not overcome and that was the automatic out in the 9 spot. Coach Rob hopes he never has to go through that again but he couldn't be any more proud of these guys for the way they took on the adverse situation and made great play after great play. In the long run of their baseball careers these kids got the win today.

Luke Martin had a monster weekend at the plate going 5 for 8 in the tourney.