Dillos Baseball shows resilience in playoff loss to Sabinal

The San Saba High School varsity baseball fought very hard this past week as the Dillos fell to Sabinal High School in their best-of-three playoff series for the 2A bidistrict round.

Game 1: San Saba Dillos 5, Sabinal Yellowjackets 15

Although they got a fast start and held their own for most of the game, the Dillos would eventually falter late in Game 1 on May 6 and fell 15-5 to the Yellowjackets. In the top of the first in

In the top of the first inning, following an error and two walks, San Saba got on the board first when Lane King drew a full-count walk with the bases loaded to put the Dillos up 1-0. San Saba got its second run of the inning when Andrew Graham grounded out to increase the Dillos’ advantage to 2-0 over Sabinal.

After Sabinal tied things up at 2-2 in the bottom of the first inning, that score would hold up until the Yellowjackets added three runs in the third inning and four runs in the fourth inning to take a 9-2 lead. However, the Dillos mounted a comeback attempt in the top of the fifth inning starting with a sacrifice fly by Logan Glover that scored the speedy Wesley Lackey from third base. After Reagan Mejia and Risien Shahan would eventually score on wild pitchers, San Saba had cut the Sabinal lead down to just 9-5.

Unfortunately for the Dillos, the high-powered Sabinal offense really kicked things into high gear in the bottom of the fifth inning as their hot hitting produced six more runs. With an RBI single by Sabinal, the 10-run mercy rule was put into play as San Saba was defeated 15-5 in Game 1.

Game 2: San Saba Dillos 3, Sabinal Yellowjackets 8

The Dillos were extremely competitive in Game 2 on May 8 as their backs were against the wall to a very good Yellowjackets team.

For the second straight game of this series, the Dillos managed to get on the board quickly with runs in the first inning. In the bottom of the first, San Saba got going with an RBI groundout by Glover and another RBI single that was ripped by Graham to put the Dillos up 2-0 early. Following one run score each in the top of the second and third innings by Sabinal, the game would remain tied 2-2 until the fifth inning as both pitchers held the opposing offense in check. After Sabinal went ahead 4-2 in the top of the fifth inning, San Saba cut the deficit to 4-3 when Shahan smacked an RBI single to center field that scored Lackey. Unfortunately for the Dillos, this was as close as they got the rest of the way as the Yellowjackets added one run in the sixth and three more runs in the seventh inning.

Despite the 8-3 loss, the underdog Dillos’ pitching certainly held its own as Glover threw over 100 pitches in 6.1 innings of work with five hits allowed. Mejia came on in re lief by striking out two Sabinal batters with zero runs allowed.

Be sure to check out next week’s edition of the San Saba News & Star for more updates on Dillos and Lady Dillos varsity athletics.

Sports editor Andrew Salmi can be contacted via email at salmi.courier@gmail.com or by cell phone at (818) 645-1115.