The baseball team of coach Chris Hayes (24-18 overall, 7-12 Mid-Florida Conference) will be at Jack Pantelias Field today (Saturday) for a 1 p.m. M-FC contest with Santa Fe College.
The team will travel to Palatka on Monday to face St. Johns River State College at 6 p.m. and then return to Sanford for its final home game on Friday (April 22) against Lake-Sumter Community College at 2:30 p.m. The Raiders will close out the regular season next Saturday at 1 p.m. at Daytona State College.
In its most recent three games, the baseball team has gone 1-2, beating the College of Central Florida at Pantelias Field last Saturday, scoring two runs in the bottom of the ninth inning for a 3-2 walk-off victory.
Tyson Young picked up the victory in relief to run his record to 4-0, while Willie Medina and Oviedo’s Todd Hankins were both 2-for-4 with a run scored and Tyler Lesch was 2-for-5 with a triple.
But the Patriots got their vengeance on Monday in Ocala as they got a walk-off, 8-7, win on bases loaded walk. Five different Raiders had multiple-hit games led by Hankins (3-for-5, double, two runs, two RBI), Stephen Christiansen (3-for-4, run, two RBI) and Lake Howell’s Gabby Juarbe (3-for-4, run).
The Raiders then dropped a heartbreaker to rive Daytona State at home on Wednesday as the Falcons scored five runs in the 11th inning to edge the hosts, 8-3.
The softball team under Courtney Miller continued its outstanding season this week, winning four of six games to improve to 39-18 overall and 17-5 in conference.
The team is at Florida State College at Jacksonville for a 1 p.m. doubleheader today (Saturday) and will close out the regular season on Thursday (April 21) by hosting St. Petersburg College in a non-conference doubleheader at the Raider Softball Field beginning at 2:30 p.m.
The week got off to a bad start for the No. 7 ranked Raiders as they dropped a doubleheader to No. 4 Santa Fe College at home, 1-0 and 3-2, last Saturday.
After being held to three hits in the first game, Christy Baranet had three hits and Kayla Ramey (2-for-3) and Kristie Hoeffer drove in second inning runs to tie the nightcap at 2-2, but the Saints plated the winning run in the fifth to complete the sweep.
But the Raiders bounced back quickly with M-FC sweeps over the College of Central Florida, 17-1 and 6-2, in Ocala on Tuesday and St. Johns River State College, 10-2 and 8-0, at home on Thursday.
The box scores have not been posted for the Central Florida games, but Sanford’s Kaylee Tabor hit two home runs in the opening and had another blast in the nightcap and Jessica Gipson and Jordan Cook also homered for the locals in the first game.
In the first game against St. Johns, Gipson was 3-for-4 with a home run, two runs scored and two RBI to lead a 13-hit attack. Kayla Ramey (2-for-4, triple, two runs, RBI), Tabor (2-for-3, run) and Lake Mary’s Tara Turner (2-for-3, RBI) also had multiple-hit games.
In the nightcap, Cook (3-for-3, home run, two runs, RBI), Gipson (2-for-3, home run, two runs, two RBI) and Lauren Vinson (2-for-2, home run, run, two RBI) all homered, while Baranet (2-for-3, double, run) and Hoeffer (2-for-3, double, run, RBI) also had multiple-hit outings in the contest stopped after five innings by the run rule.