Panther boys stay hot

The Panther boys simply can't be stopped in the month of June. The Panthers won their ninth and 10th straight games on Thursday night, beating Southeast Conference rival Washington 9-5 and 4-3 to stay tied for first place in the SEC.

Mt. Pleasant scored the first nine runs in game one. Chase Lamm hit an RBI single in the first inning to give Mt. Pleasant a 1-0 lead. The Panthers added three runs in the third, three in the fourth on a bases-clearing double by Clayton Lowery, and two more in the fifth.

Panther starter Jaxon Hoyle kept the Demons at bay for the first five frames, but they batted around in the sixth. Washington scored five runs in the inning, getting a double from Brady Knutson and singels from Ethan Patterson, Kole Hinrichsen and Brandon Dickel.

Mt. Pleasant's Bryce Anderson came in to pitch in relief in the sixth. He forced Cade Hennigan into an ending-inning groundout and cruised through the seventh, giving up just one hit to seal the win.

The Panthers won the first game of their previous doubleheader in Washington earlier this season but suffered a 16-3 loss in game two. Head coach Brent Broeker said that was on Mt. Pleasant's mind after seeing the Demons start to rally in game one.

'Up there, we beat them the first game and they pounded us in the second game,” Broeker said. 'We were worried that they had a little momentum going into that second game, but Nik (Coble) went out and pitched well enough to hold them to one.

Coble started game two for Mt. Pleasant and had the Demon hitters off-balance early. Hinrichsen looked strong on the mound for Washington, but the Washington starter ran into some rough luck on a couple of wild pitches.

The first Demon miscue of game two came with Trace White up to bat. He struck out on a wild pitch, and the throw down to first went over first basemen Chase McDole's head and in to right field for what turned into a two-run scoring little league triple. White then scored on a wild pitch later in the frame and Mt. Pleasant led 3-0.

Knutson cut the lead to 3-1 with an RBI in the top of the third. The score stayed 3-1 until Hoyle knocked in a run on an RBI single in the bottom of the sixth to stretch it to 4-1.

Washington made it very interesting in teh top of the seventh. The Demons scored one run on an error and Patterson hit a two-out RBI single off the pitcher to cut the Panther lead to 4-3.

Despite momentum favoring the Demon offense, Anderson, who came in to relieve Coble in the fourth inning, struck the last batter out to end the threat and strand two on base.

'I'm really excited for this team, we just for some reason can't get all three facets of the game going at the same time,” said Demon head coach Nathan Miller. 'Last night we played Central Lee and threw a five-hitter and got beat. Tonight we threw a five-hitter in the first game and get beat and thew a three-hitter in the second game and got beat.”

Mt. Pleasant moved to 16-5 with their 10th win in a row. They are now 11-3 in conference play, tied with Fairfield for first place. Washington fell to 13-7 overall and 9-5 in the SEC.