Pitchers come up big offensively in West Stokes win
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Jimmy Kuhn/The Stokes News
They came up huge at the plate as well.
Durham, the relief pitcher, had two homeruns while Wilmoth, the team’s starter on the hill, belted one over the wall to lead the Wildcats to a 7-2 victory over North Surry on Tuesday night in King.
“Amos and Blaine played a great game all around for us,” said West Stokes head coach Kirk Goodson. “They did a good job on the mound for us and they did a good job getting us started early at the plate.”
The win improves the Wildcats to 8-3 overall and keeps them in a tie for first place with Bishop McGuinness in the Northwest 1A/2A Conference standings.
Coming into Tuesday’s game, the Greyhounds were 4-2 in the conference. Goodson called it “the biggest game of the season so far” for the Wildcats because he knew that the Greyhounds could inch back into the conference hunt with an upset over the Wildcats.
“Coming in, we knew that they were 4-2 in the conference,” said Goodson. “So this was the biggest game of the season for us so far because we needed to separate ourselves from them.”
West got things started off right when Wilmoth knocked a two-run homerun over the centerfield wall in the bottom of the first inning, which gave the Wildcats a comfortable 2-0 lead early.
Durham came to the plate a little bit later and knocked his first bomb over the right field wall, which added two more runs and gave West Stokes a 4-0 lead after one.
In the bottom of the second inning, Durham belted another two-run shot over the wall to build West’s lead to 6-0.
On the mound, Wilmoth and Durham combined to no-hit the Greyhounds.
Goodson has been a part of several West Stokes no-hitters before, but not one where the winning team gives up two runs as a result.
“That’s the first time I’ve seen that happen,” said Goodson jokingly. “I was pleased with both guys on the mound. Amos did a good job of keeping the ball down and throwing strikes. He was on a pitch count tonight. Once he reached his number, he got a little winded. We took him out and put Blaine in and he didn’t miss a beat.”
Wilmoth threw four strikeouts on 60 pitches while picking up the win for West Stokes. Durham came on in relief and also threw four strikeouts.
The Greyhounds scored both of their runs in the bottom of the sixth inning. Durham walked one of the runs in with bases loaded. The other came on a defensive lapse when West Stokes thought there were two outs in the inning.
The Wildcats will host county foe North Stokes on Friday night in King. The last time the Vikings and Wildcats met, West Stokes came away with the 9-0 win.
Goodson says that he isn’t taking the Vikings nor anyone else in the conference lightly.
“In this conference, anybody can beat anybody on a given night,” said Goodson. “We can’t take anyone for granted and we can’t afford to take a night off. Every game from here on out is a big game. We’re just going to let the chips fall where they may.”
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