Murfin’s pitching and key bunt help end two streaks

Patoka ended South Central’s undefeated season with a 9-3 win last Wednesday. The Warriors  also ended a six-year losing streak to the Cougars.

In his first start of the season, Luke Murfin pitched a gem for Patoka and laid down a pivotal bunt in the Warriors’ win.

Murfin got off to a little bit of a bumpy start as he gave up two runs in the first two innings. Both of the runners that scored reached base via walks.

The Cougars’ starting pitcher, Dylan Sill, had a solid start, as he didn’t allow a baserunner through the first three innings.

During Patoka’s second time through the lineup, they started to hit Sill’s pitching. Drew Baldridge led off the top of the fourth with a single. Nick Beard followed with a walk. With runners on first and second, Murfin dropped down a bunt to move both runners up. The throw to first to get Murfin, went into right field allowing Baldridge and Beard to score and Murfin to move up to second. A  single by John Spicer drove in  Murfin, giving Patoka a 3-2 lead. Spicer scored before the inning ended with the Warriors up 4-2.

Patoka scored three more runs in the fifth inning, going up 7-2. The Warriors were helped out by a couple of South Central errors that stretched out the inning.

The Cougars had more problems with dropped balls and errors in the sixth, when they gave up two more runs.

"I told the team, ‘You have to give [Patoka] some credit, and you’ve got to give yourselves a lot of blame,’" South Central coach Kurt Jones said.  

South Central was able to score one in the sixth, but went three-up, three-down in the seventh to lose its first game of the season.

Murfin got the win, striking out 12 and giving up five hits.

"Murfin is one of the best pitchers in the area," Jones said. "They had some timely hits. We set up all those timely hits with our lack of making the play on fly balls, so it kind of worked both ways."

The Warriors picked up their first win in their first game.

"A win’s perfect, but we didn’t play perfect and they realize that we’ve got some things to work on," Patoka coach Joe Eddy said.

Patoka is back in action Thursday at Clay City at 4:15 p.m.