COLUMBIA – In a battle between the top two teams in the state, Fort Mill Post 43 got the better of Florence Post 1 7-4 and will play on the final day of the American Legion Senior State Tournament at Segra Park.
Fort Mill will now play Camden Post 17 at 1 p.m. in Columbia and will need to win to advance to the championship game against Florence at 4 p.m. All three teams have one loss in the double-elimination tournament. Post 43 is now 19-5 on the season with the win Saturday night.
Fort Mill went down early 4-0 after the first inning, but methodically managed to chip away at the Florence lead until the sixth inning when they scored three-runs to break a 4-4 tie. Post 43 scattered 15 hits in the game as both Connor Rasmussen and Chase Dougherty each went 3-4 in the game for Fort Mill.
In the sixth inning, Patrick Matthews was hit by a pitch to start the inning as Kenan Bowman followed with a single. Harrison Wilson would break the 4-4 tie with a sacrifice fly, as he went 2-4 with a triple and two RBI in the game, Rasmussen and Dougherty would single and Scott Young would walk for another run to score and give Post 43 all the offense they would need.
While he didn’t get the start, Dusty Sanderlin came in to the game in the second inning and pitched six innings allowing five hits, but no runs, while walking three and striking out six.
After the four run first inning by Florence, Fort Mill started to chip away scoring one run in the second through fifth inning. Post 43 got on the board with an RBI single from Aaron Pendergast scoring Dougherty in the second inning. Wilson had an RBI single in the third inning scoring Bowman and Nic Curtis had an RBI sacrifice in the fourth to score Pendergast, who tripled in the inning.
Dougherty would then double in the fifth inning to score Wilson, who opened the inning with a triple, which tied the game at 4-4. Florence used five pitchers in the game for Post 1.
The winner of the state championship Sunday heads to Pelham, Ala. next week to play in the Southeast Regional in an effort to make it to the American Legion World Series in Shelby, N.C. in two weeks.
Mac Banks: mac@fortmillprepsports.com, @fortprep
