The venue had both teams a bit giddy. Not too many high school baseball players get to play on a Division I field, especially when they’re still in high school and moreover, at the home of one of the best collegiate teams in the country. Monday evening, the Miller School hosted Georgetown Prep at Davenport Field, the University of Virginia baseball team’s facility. It was a perfect day, a perfect site and a pair of amazing pitching performances. As one visiting fan put it best — they should have played two.
It had been 30 days since Miller lost a game going back to a 5-0 loss to Turner Ashby back on March 22nd. Yet a 2-0 loss to a talented Georgetown Prep squad in which the Mavericks were held to just two hits didn’t bother Miller coach Billy Wagner too much.
“I thought that what was unique today was that we hadn’t faced a team this savvy and competed in this kind of environment,” Wagner said. “We’re young and to get this exposure, play a team like this and play at Davenport — I’m just happy. To lose a game and be happy is probably odd, but you can be that in high school. You don’t get to do that in college or in the pros. We’d love to play those guys four or five more times a year.”
The Hoyas’ Andrew Ashur and the Mavericks Nathan Gentry spun a pair of gems on the mound in a classic pitchers’ duel. The game was almost entirely a show of pitching and impressive defense as neither team committed an error.
“Andrew is just one of those guys who when he’s doing well, he’s not overpowering you, he’s throwing a ton of strikes,” said Georgetown coach Chris Rodriguez. “He’s been playing varisty ball since he was a freshman and he just attacks batters. He throws a ton of strikes and keeps the defense engaged. For us, that’s a big deal because we play good defense behind him.”
The Hoyas took a 1-0 lead in the top of the third when Stephen Johnston hit a solo shot to left field that bounced off a banner in Davenport that is above the home run line. Initially ruled a double, the 3-man umpiring crew got together and corrected the call.
Outside of that, it was Ashur and Gentry going back and forth. While Ashur only gave up a pair of hits, both at the hands of Miller junior Jack Morris, Gentry worked his way through back-to-back jams in the fourth and fifth to keep Georgetown from getting an ever important 2-run lead. In the seventh with Henley off the mound, the Hoyas manufactured their insurance run after a strikeout in the dirt allowed Vincent Walker to reach first. Walker then stole second and was driven in by Johnston on a sacrifice fly.
“I think 80 percent of our games have been 1-run or 2-run games and we lost a lot of them early,” Rodriguez said. “This group kept their composure and it wasn’t easy because playing here on this field was such a treat. We were just jacked out of our minds when we got on the field. (Johnston) has been hot lately and he came out and got us that extra run and that was big.”
In the bottom of the seventh, Morris gave Miller the start it needed, leading off by getting hit by a pitch. After stealing second he reached third on a ground ball, but Ashur kept his shutout in tact with his fifth strikeout ending the game.
“We saw a crafty left hander from them go up against one of our freshmen and they just battled pitch after pitch,” Wagner said of the pitchers duel. “It was a well played game.”
Miller had just four base runners and three of them were Morris who went 2 for 2 with a double and a pair of stolen bases.
“Jack had a huge game for us and with what he had, if we’d have had one more hit we’d have been all right,” Wagner said. “We just couldn’t come up with it.”
Gentry threw six innings in the loss, but gave up just six hits and a walk.
For Georgetown Prep (15-7), Tanner Sampson was 2 for 3 with a triple and a walk. Johnston was 1 for 3 with a pair of RBI. Ashur earned the complete game shutout with just two hits, a walk and a batter hit by a pitch.
Miller (11-5) travels to Steward on Tuesday at 4:30 p.m.
