Locking up the victory: MCC shuts down Baton Rouge

By Robby Atkinson / Special to The Star The Meridian Star

MERIDIAN — The Meridian Community College Eagles have enjoyed many years of success on the baseball diamond and the Eagles wrote a new chapter to that success Sunday at Scaggs Field. MCC got a complete game shutout from freshman Dustin McWilliams and former Meridian High standout Kenny Roberts belted a pair of home runs as the Eagles swept Baton Rouge 12-0 to secure the 2010 Miss-Lou Conference Championship. The championship for the Eagles is one of many at MCC and the most important fact is that the Eagles (30-16) have earned the right to host the 2010 Region 23 Tournament at Scaggs Field May 14-16th.

"We knew coming into the weekend what we had to do in order to host the tournament and we did a great job all weekend," said MCC head coach Chris Rose. "We hope that we are getting hot at the right time and this team has gone through some difficult times this season. It will take a great effort to win the regional and we hope to continue to carry this momentum into the postseason."

The Eagles got the scoring started early with four runs in the bottom of the first inning to take a 4-0 lead over Baton Rouge. Jonathan Pace got the inning started with a single and Ben Kinglsey followed by reaching on an error to put a pair runners on board for the Eagles. The first run of the inning scored on an RBI single by Darren Farmer and Roberts followed with a two run home run to give MCC a 4-0 lead. The game entered into a three hour rain delay moments later and didn't resume until the middle part of the afternoon, but that didn't slow down the MCC offense.

MCC scored two more times in the bottom of the second inning to extend its lead to 6-0 over the Bears. Pace led the inning off with a triple off the wall in left field and later scored on a sacrifice fly by Kingsley to make the score 5-0 in favor of MCC. Roberts pushed the lead to 6-0 moments later on a towering home run that eventually landed in the parking lot in left field to give the freshman second baseman 16 home runs for 2010. Corey Dickerson currently leads the Eagles in the home run category with 19 home runs. Roberts hit four home runs in the three game series against Baton Rouge.

"It was probably one of the longer home runs that has been hit at our ballpark," added Rose. "He (Roberts) had such a great weekend at the plate and played such great defense at second base. We had guys throughout the whole lineup that had a great weekend and we are swinging the bats exceptionally well right now."

The Eagles continued to pull away with two more runs in the bottom of the third inning to make the score 8-0. Michael LeGrange scored one of the runs on a solo home run to left field and Kenny Sanders followed with a solo home run of his own to give Meridian an eight run lead. The Eagles put the game away for good with four more runs in the fourth inning to roll to the run rule victory over the Bears. Avi Ahlzadeh drove one run in on a sacrifice fly and Sanders added a two run double in the inning for MCC. The Eagles ended the game with 10 total hits and the Bears only managed three hits.

McWilliams (6-1) earned the pitching win for MCC by going five innings and collecting four strikeouts. The Eagles will close out the 2010 regular season at home with a pair of game next weekend at Scaggs Field. The Eagles will take on Lurleen B. Wallace in a single game on Friday at 4 p.m. and will wrap up the regular season on Saturday against Panola in a single game beginning at 4 p.m.