Published: July 03, 2008 05:42 pm         

Tuttle battles Chickasha in Red Dirt play

TUTTLE – A strong pitching performance from their senior ace Heath Wilda got Chickasha past Tuttle 7-3 at Brian Stewart Field Saturday to end the Tigers’ summer season. Wilda scattered five hits and struck out thirteen going the full seven innings in a battle between the two pool winners to put the Chicks into Sunday’s Red Dirt “Final Four.”

Wilda had no answer for senior shortstop Ryan McIntosh, though, who drove in all three Tuttle runs and accounted for three of the team’s five hits with a towering, leadoff home run to start off the first, an RBI single in the fifth and an RBI double in the seventh.

Senior Will Bennett got the start for Tuttle and held the Chicks off until the third inning, when they put together a four-run rally to take control of the game.

Two-hole Tylor Lee singled to left and Wilda legged out a soft roller to short, just beating McIntosh’s bullet to first baseman Heath Long to put runners on first and second.

Cleanup hitter Braden Cook’s single to right scored Lee easily and Chickasha ended up with runners on second and third on Jake Simpson’s throw home. Courtesy runner Dylan Shepard, running for Wilda, scored when McIntosh’s hurried throw trying to get Kory Keef sailed and Cook tagged up from third to score on Colin Hightower’s sacrifice fly to center.

Nine-hole Drake Morris got Chickasha an insurance run in the fourth, doubling to the left field wall and later scoring on a wild pitch and Chickasha scored two more runs in the sixth playing small-ball.

Devan Shepard led off the inning with a bunt single and Bennett hit Taylor Wilson to put two on. Morris beat out a bunt to load them up and leadoff hitter Chance Thomas crushed the ball to straightaway center for a two-run double. In some trouble again, Tuttle worked their way out of another big inning with two defensive gems.

Center fielder Bryce Ebert’s hard-charging scoop of Lee’s broken-bat dying quail robbed him of a drop-in hit then McIntosh’s bullet home on Wilda’s hard chopper got Morris as catcher Christian Ellis had to go airborne for the throw and get the out with a swipe tag coming back down.

After coming up empty in the home sixth, Tuttle used two more highlight-reel defensive plays to keep Chickasha from scoring in the top of the seventh. Left fielder Josh Christen robbed Keef of extra bases with a running, over-the-shoulder grab of his very long fly ball and Long ended the inning with an unassisted double play, pulling in Christian Fincher’s screaming liner and doubling Hightower off.

Wilda nicked Bennett with one out in Tuttle’s last lick and McIntosh’s opposite-field double scored him for the final Tiger run before Wilda got Cory Potter swinging to finish the game.

With the win, Chickasha avenges the Tiger’s championship at the Chicks’ tourney two weeks ago and advances to Sunday’s Final Four at Putnam City, where they’ll try to repeat as Red Dirt champions.