A well-timed winning streak for the Aiken County Post 26/153 baseball team met an untimely end Wednesday night, leaving them in need of another string of wins to improve their postseason hopes.
Aiken County had risen to second place in the American Legion Junior AA standings thanks to a three-game winning streak fueled by clutch hitting and strong pitching. That formula didn't repeat itself against first-place Richland Post 215 Navy, dropping Aiken County to third with another meeting between the two scheduled for Thursday night.
Richland Navy took advantage of three Aiken County errors, nine walks and two hit batters to push runs across the plate, then added some timely hits to overcome five errors of their own in an 11-7 win at Midland Valley.
Aiken County held a 3-1 lead through three innings in support of starting pitcher Caleb Arthur, with Tyler Tindall driving in one on a double and Kingston Sweetnam scoring on an error in the bottom of the first and Sweetnam going station to station after a leadoff single to score in the bottom of the third.
Then the wheels started to fall off for Aiken County, with Richland Navy scoring nine runs over the next two innings.
They plated four runs in the top of the fourth after loading the bases with two outs to take a 5-3 lead, only for Aiken County to respond with four in the home half to retake the lead at 7-5.
Macon Williams and Jeremiah Yarborough drew back-to-back walks to start the bottom of the fourth, and leadoff batter Dale Pearson followed that up with an RBI single. Troy Stancel walked, Arthur singled and Chris Hair reached on an error that scored Stancel, putting Aiken County back in front.
That lead was short-lived. Richland Navy loaded the bases after a walk, an error and an infield single, then capitalized with back-to-back run-scoring singles to go back ahead 10-7.
Aiken County's contagious hitting went cold from there, as Richland Navy struck out the side in the bottom of the fifth and allowed only a leadoff walk to Pearson in the bottom of the sixth.
Still, though, this is an Aiken County team offense that has been the most dangerous with its back against the wall. Hair drew a one-out walk and stole second in the bottom of the seventh, and Caleb Viar singled and then moved to second on a Blake Freeland groundout to put two runners in scoring position.
There was no two-out magic this time, though, with a strikeout ending the game and dropping Aiken County to 4-3 in league play.
Sweetnam led the offense with two of the team's seven hits, and Tindall, Pearson, Arthur and Hair each had an RBI. Aiken County struck out 13 times, though, with six of those coming in the last three innings.
Richland Navy strengthened its hold on the top spot in the standings with the win, improving to 6-1-1. Richland Post 215 White jumped past Aiken County at 5-3-2, with North Augusta Post 71 just behind Aiken County at 4-3-1.
Aiken County had a chance to close the gap Thursday night at Richland Navy, with two road games to follow next week. Aiken County visits Irmo Post 7 on July 1, then travels to face Post 79 Eagles the next night.
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