Eagles Baseball Host Successful “SouthEast Rumble” Tourney

David Finney | photo by Angel Cornista

Waleska, GA - Before getting into the final day of games for the SouthEast Rumble, I would like to put the spotlight on Coach Jonathan Burton, his coaching staff, and his players.  It was a monumental task hosting the eight-team tournament at two different locations. The logistics of making everything coordinate and flow smoothly takes a lot of planning and manpower. Months of preparation went into the planning and making sure everything was top notch for the teams coming in to play. It is a great reflection on Reinhardt University and the RU Athletic Department. Of course, there were minor "bugs" along the way, however, it was a successful three days of baseball, and the schools playing in the tournament seemed to have enjoyed the experience.

On the final day of the tournament, Reinhardt would face St. Thomas who had gone 3-0 on the weekend beating Tennessee Wesleyan, Taylor University, and Faulkner University. The matchup between the Eagles and St. Thomas would be the first of three games on a beautiful Saturday afternoon at Ken White Field. The Eagles were coming into the game with one against Faulkner on Thursday and losing a close one against Taylor on Friday night. 

Ethan Foley would get the start for Reinhardt for this final game of the weekend and he had a really strong six innings of pitching. He held the Bobcast of St. Thomas scoreless for the first four innings. He did run into a little trouble in the fifth inning when a routine flyball was dropped in the outfield with two outs allowing the inning to continue. Two runs were scored against the Eagles on a St. Thomas homerun. Foley was relieved by Jaily Paredes in the sixth inning and Paredes was able to get the Eagles out of the inning without any more runs being scored. Jordan Hampton would pitch the eighth inning followed by Parker Miller to finish up the ninth.

The Eagles would struggle somewhat with hitting for the day only picking up three runs. They scored one run in the third, one in the fifth, and the last one in the seventh. In the third inning, Alvaro Valdez singled to the third basemen of St. Thomas and was moved over to third on two ground outs by the Eagles. With two outs in the third, Patrick Baggett stepped to the plate to get a single scoring Valez.

In the fifth inning, Will Underwood would single to center field followed by another single by Jarrett Burney. Underwood would score as Nick Sanders laid down a nice bunt up the line towards first base and this allowed Underwood to score from third.

In the bottom of the seventh, the Eagles would get their final run of the night on a bases-loaded walk pushing Underwood in to score.  There was hope by the Eagle faithful that more runs would be scored, but the Bobcats pitchers were too much for the Reinhardt batters as many of them were hitting a consistent 90 mph on the radar.

Overall, the Eagles had a competitive showing against all the teams that they played in the tournament. The team just needs to fix a few minor issues and mistakes that create innings to extend. It is a team full of talent and they will learn how to put complete games together. Coach Burton had this to say about the game and the tournament, "Tough week of games for us as a team. We just aren't finishing games the way we need to in order to beat good baseball teams. All we can do is get back to work and work harder."

The Eagles are under good leadership and have talent so good things will happen as the team continues on improving on this early season. Reinhardt will be back in action at home for a Wednesday afternoon game with Tennesee Southern and then a  weekend series with Spring Arbor. Please see the Eagles Baseball schedule on the website for all the game listings. RU Baseball Schedule