Coming into the season, Ryle knew they had an arsenal of arms to help them make a deep run come late May, early June.
On Saturday in the 9th Region baseball championship, the Raiders needed just one arm to help them secure their first regional baseball title since 2013, defeating Dixie Heights 2-1 at Thomas More Stadium in Florence.
“Speechless, humbling,” Raiders coach Joe Aylor said. “There’s a lot of coaches that don’t get this chance and definitely one I’m not taking for granted.”
Sam Eppley was lights out in a pitchers duel with Dixie Heights’ Brach Rice, pitching a complete game three-hitter and struck out 10.
Fastball, curveball, changeup, slider…it was all working for Eppley, a senior that has signed with Xavier. He struck out the first five batters he faced on the day.
“They were missing every single ball I was throwing in the first couple innings,” Eppley said. “Going into later innings they were going to adjust and get used to it and I let my defense do the work and they did.”
The performance earned Eppley tournament MVP honors as he won two of the three games for the Raiders in the tournament, notching the W in a 11-1 victory over St. Henry in the opening round.
While they have a deep set of arms on the Raiders team, they needed just three pitchers to get through the regional tourney. Eppley starting and finishing two games, Dylan McIntyre going six innings against Covington Catholic while Caleb Mann pitched an inning for the win over the Colonels.
It doesn’t just stop there and could be a big weapon when the Raiders head to the state tournament next week.
“We’ve got the depth obviously and we really barely even use that depth because the way the schedule worked out this week,” Aylor said. “We’ve definitely got that depth and the pitching obviously today was huge. Sam was coming in on four days rest, he was ready to go and he shoved.”
The game-winning hit was provided in the first inning. With three runs combined between the two, Oli Morris’s two-run double down the right field line was all that Eppley needed. The Raiders were given an extra out in the frame as Josh Caudill reached on an error on a grounder to third with two outs.
That put runners on the corners, AJ Curry leading off the inning getting hit by a pitch. It was the lone error of the game, but it proved to be costly.
“I thought we’d keep rolling from there, but it turned out to just be enough,” Morris said. “I don’t really put much that way, but I finally got something I could handle and did my job. Got a fastball I could handle.”
Morris hit a liner over the first baseman’s head, scoring Curry and initially pinch-runner Noah Crist was being held at third, but Aylor decided to send him and Crist slid into home safely.
“I kind of stopped him and then at the last minute I sent him. That was on me,” Aylor said. “I was kind of waiting to see how he (the right fielder) played that and he played it clean and then when I saw the throw to second is when we made the decision to go. My nerves would have been a lot worse for the last six innings if I would have known this was going to be a 2-1 game.”
That’s all Eppley needed, the lone Colonels run coming in the third when Mason Granger led off with a triple and later scored on a Carter Schroer sacrifice fly RBI.
Dixie never got a runner to second base from there, Eppley silencing a lineup that put up 19 runs and 28 hits in the first two games of the tournament.
The Colonels nearly had a runner at second with two outs in the seventh, but Carson Pullum was tagged out at second trying to stretch a single into a double on a bloop in left center. Mann made a heads up play from coming over from first base, Anthony Coppola gathering the ball after three Ryle players nearly collided to get to the bloop hit, Coppola firing to Mann for the final out.
“I was lost, didn’t know what was going at that moment and forgot everything,” Eppley said. “Next thing I know on the bottom of the dogpile. It was pretty cool.”
For as great as Eppley was, Rice was just as good for Dixie. Rice finished with a complete game four-hitter, the two runs being unearned to go with four strikeouts and hit two batters. Between the two pitchers combined, they needed just 146 pitches to complete the game, 105 of them going for strikes. The game needed just 70 minutes to complete.
It’s the last athletic event in high school for Rice, the senior football signee to Miami (Ohio). He leaves behind a legacy as the school’s all-time leading tackler in football and a standout in baseball and played basketball for a couple of years, too.
“Heck of an athlete for Dixie Heights High School,” Colonels coach Chris Maxwell said.
Rice initially wasn’t going to play baseball this season to focus strictly on football, but he eventually joined right before the season started and got the ball in the team’s biggest game of the season.
“Very proud he came back out to play baseball, indicated he wasn’t going to, we had a long talk and I’m glad he came back,” Maxwell said.
The loss denies Maxwell his fourth region title. He last won the region in 2001, coming up short in the last four attempts in 2004, 2010, 2013 and on Saturday.
“It’s that carrot on a stick, got dang you’re that close,” Maxwell said. “It’s enjoyable, I enjoy being around the kids. Not that I’m knowledgeable, but my wisdom and what I’ve learned over all these years and being able to pass that on and see them get it throughout the season and improve is very rewarding.”
The Colonels will graduate 12 seniors.
Ryle will meet East Carter in the first round of the KHSAA state tournament on Friday at 10 a.m. at Legends Field in Lexington.
All-Tournament Team
RAIDERS 2, COLONELS 1
DIXIE HEIGHTS — 001-000-0 — 1-3-1
RYLE — 200-000-x — 2-4-0
2B — (R) Morris
3B — (DH) Granger
WP — Eppley. LP — Rice.
Records: Dixie Heights 26-15, Ryle 31-9
