By Mark Carpenter
People’s Defender
“If there is a tie for first place in sports with Division I and II or a tie for first or second place in sports without divisions, the tie breaker will be the head-to-head contest. If the teams split the head-to-head contests, it will result in a tie.”
Written above is a relatively new by-law passed by the board members of the Southern Hills Athletic Conference to determine division champions in the case of a tie. The rule has not come-into effect often, but it has this spring in the standings for the small school division in baseball. The Manchester Greyhounds and Peebles Indians both completed conference play with identical 9-4 records but the Greyhounds swept the two head-to-head match ups, thereby claiming the outright small school championship, the second in a row for Coach Trey Meade and his squad.
“I am ecstatic,” said Meade, the second-year Manchester head coach. “I’m very proud and happy for our guys the way they battled and grinded through the season. It’s the first time that Manchester baseball has won back-to-back titles, which is pretty awesome.”
The Greyhounds played a trio of conference games last season and won two of the three, beginning with a thrilling come-from-behind walkoff win over Peebles on May 5. They followed that up with a 6-2 home win over Whiteoak (sweeping the season series from the Wildcats) and then stumbled on Friday afternoon with a 6-4 home loss to the Fairfield Lions.
In the Peebles game, the Hounds too an early lead, saw the Indians rally to take a lead, then rallied themselves to produce bottom of the seventh walkoff excitement for their home fans.
The Greyhounds went without a hit for the first four inning off of Peebles starter Caleb Johnson, but still managed to scrape across a run in the first and a run in the third, one scoring on a wild pitch and the second when leadoff hitter Traevyn Hilderbrand was hit by a pitch with the bases full.
The Indians scored a single run in the top of the third off of Manchester starter Luke Applegate and then took a 4-2 lead after plating three more in the top half of the fourth. The back and forth continued as the visiting Tribe picked up single runs in the fifth and sixth while the Greyhounds put up one in the bottom of the fifth on a Peebles error and then added three int he bottom of the sixth to tie the game at six apiece.
In that three-run sixth, Applegate led off with a two-base hit followed by Clayton Colvin being hit by a pitch. Applegate came home when a Carson Innam ground ball was booted and a Parker Hayslip bunt resulted in Colvin coming across the plate. A ground out to shortstop by Braylon Rickett plated Inman with the tying run.
With Rickett in relief for the Hounds, the Indians went scoreless in the top half of the seventh, setting the stage for the bottom half heroics. The Manchester seventh began with a James Hackathorn base hit, then replaced on the bases by pinch runner Bentley Colvin. A sacrifice bunt by Landen Doyle moved Colvin to second but Hilderbrand flied out to center for the second out. Applegate was intentionally walked, bringing lefty swinging center field Clayton Colvin to the dish. Clayton made it a night for his family to remember as he slapped a base hit to left that brought his brother home with the game winner for the home team.
Rickett got the win in relief, allowing one run in two innings of work while Johnson took the tough loss, allowing just four hits and three earned runs. The Manchester pitchers, APplegate and Rickett, combined to strike out 19 Peebles hiters.
That win put the Greyhounds in the small school driver’s seat but they still had work to do, beginning two days later with a home game against the Whiteoak Wildcats. The story of that day was the pitching effort of Traevyn Hilderbrand, who tosses six innings for the win, surrendering just four hits and garnering six strikeouts.
Thought hey now had the small school title secure, the Hounds had one last conference game to play and that happened on May 8 as they hosted the Fairfield Lions, a team they had beaten 11-6 at Fairfield back on April 16. Things didn’t go as well for the Greyhounds this time around as they fell in an early hole to the Lions and could never dig themselves out, falling 6-4 in their SHAC finale for 2026.
A busy week concluded on Saturday, May 9 for the Greyhounds and it was another game on the short end,a non-conference 6-5 loss to the Bethel-Tate Tigers, that left the blue and gold with an overall mark of 10-8 for eh season with a pair of non-conference games with Greenfield McLain and Portsmouth Notre Dame remaining this week.
Peebles bounced back from their loss at Manchester with a vengeance, winning their final two conference games, downing Fairfield 6-1 on May 7 and then winning 10-5 on the turf at Whiteoak on May 8. Going into this week, the Tribe sported an overall mark of 14-8 with non-conference contests remaining with Green and Western Latham.
Box Score
Peebles
001 311 0 —6
Manchester
101 013 1 —7
Peebles Hitting (AB-R-H-RBI): Grooms 4-0-1-1, Gross 3-1-0-0, B. Johnson 4-2-1-0, C. Johnson 3-0-0-0, Schmus 2-1-0-0, Schutte 4-0-0-0, Smith 2-1-1-1, Stephens 2-1-1-0, Wilson 4-0-2-2, Team 28-6-6-4.
Extra-Base Hits: Grooms 2B; B. Johnson 2B
Manchester Hitting (AB-R-H-RBI): Applegate 2-2-1-0, Butt 3-0-0-0, C. Colvin 3-1-1-1. Doyle 0-0-0-0, Hackathorn 1-2-1-0, Hayslip 2-0-0-0, Hilderbrand 3-0-0-0, Inman 3-1-0-0, Rickett 3-1-1-1, B. COlvin 0-1-0-0, Team 20-7-4-2.
Extra-Base Hits: Applegate 2B
Peebles Pitching:
C. Johnson (L) 6.2 IP, 4 H, 7 R, 3 ER, 4 BB, 3 K
Manchester Pitching:
Applegate 5 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 4 ER, 5 BB, 14 K
Rickett (W) 2 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 5 K
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