High School Sports Report: Baseball Season Underway, Blue Ridge Wins State AAA Basketball Title

BASEBALL - The high school baseball regular season got underway on March 1st after a few weeks of pre-season scrimmages.

Travelers Rest's Devildogs after losing a sting of scrimmage games by close margins opened the regular season with a road win over Wade Hampton's Generals on March 1st. TR took that game easily, 8-1.

The Devildogs got started in the second inning when Kameron Watson hit a RBI single for an early 1-0 lead. TR added more runs in the fourth when Pwen Taylor, Devin Atkins and Haden Hartin each hit RBI singles for a 5-0 advantage.

Caleb McKittrick pitched for TR for five innings giving up only 3 hits and only one run. McKittrick struck out eight Wade Hampton Generals.

Devin Atkins was 3 for 5 at the plate with one RBI while Kameron Watson was 2 for 2. Caleb McKittrick led TR's RBI parade with 2. Hunter Covington had two stolen bases while Hunter Cheslak and Caleb Mills and Kameron Watson and one each.

TR backed up that win with a March 3rd victory over Pendleton, 6-1. Christian Nielsen doubled in a run in the second inning to get things going for TR in the second inning. Nielsen was also the winning pitcher going the full seven inning distance, yielding five hits and only one run. Owen Taylor led TR at the plate going 2 for 3 and had 1 RBI. Caled McKitrick and Christian Nielsen hit double.

Meanwhile over at Berea, the Bulldogs have been hammered in preseason games: WestOak 21 Berea 4, Landrum 12 Berea 4, and Brashier Middle College 15 Berea 9.

In the regular season opener Berea fell 15-5 to Whitmire and in the folowing game the Bulldogs lost 11-9 to Greer Middle College.

BASKETBALL - Blue Ridge High School's Fighting Tigers secured the state AAA championship on Friday night by battling back to defeat Orangeburg-Wilkinson 49-42 at Aiken's USC-Aiken. It is the first ever revenue sport state championship in the school's 68 year history. Other state titles have been in cheerleading, boys' cross country, golf and volleyball. The victory gave Blue Ridge a 27-4 record which represents the most wins by any Blue Ridge basketball team.

Blue Ridge senior, Justin Bailey pumped 29 points and grabbed 11 rebounds to lead the championship charge along with six steals. Bailley has committed to extend his basketball career with USC-Upstate.