Ozone out of World Series after loss to Georgia
Published 3:00 am Tuesday, August 11, 2015
![Messenger Photo/Dan smith John Baxley Sanders, right, hit two homeruns for Troy in Saturday’s win over Virgina. Ozone fell to Florida and Georgia, eliminating them from the World Series in South Carolina.](https://www.troymessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/24/2015/08/0810-Ozone-picweb.jpg)
Messenger Photo/Dan smith
John Baxley Sanders, right, hit two homeruns for Troy in Saturday’s win over Virgina. Ozone fell to Florida and Georgia, eliminating them from the World Series in South Carolina.
The Troy Ozone team fell to Georgia 7-4 Monday evening, ending their run in the World Series in Lexington, S.C.
Before their loss to Georgia knocked out Troy, the Ozone team picked up an 18-5 over Virginia before falling to Florida 5-3 on Sunday.
Troy got off to a good start beating Virginia handedly in game one, scoring 13 runs in the fifth inning after the game was close throughout.
Troy got things going in the first inning when Davis Allen singled. After Allen stole second base, he scored on a single by Anthony Gurba to give Troy the early lead.
The lead didn’t last very long. Virginia came back in the bottom of the first inning to tie the game up at one.
Troy came right back and scored a run in the second on base hit by Bailey Sparrow plated Levi Sikes to give Troy their second lead of the game.
Already up in the game 2-1 Troy scored three more runs in the third on a double by Gurba and two-run homerun off the bat of John Baxley Sanders giving Troy a 5-1 lead.
Sanders hit two homeruns for Troy in their win over Virginia.
Virginia scored four more runs over the next two innings to knot up the game at five each, before Troy exploded for 13 runs in the fifth inning giving Troy the win.
In the fifth Troy got run producing hits by Avery Ernsberger, Sparrow, Drew Nelson and Allen. There was also an error, a walk and a wild pitch in the inning.
“That inning gives them confidence,” said head coach Drew Nelson. “It shows them that they can explode at any time.
The next night against Florida, the key hits fell short for Troy in a 5-3 loss.
Troy and Florida were even in the hit column, but Troy committed three errors in the inning, which factored into the loss.
“We never really got things going,” Nelson said. “We spread out hits, but they pitched well and got some big hits. We made a few errors, and those errors cost us a few runs. It was a game we should have won if we kept it clean.”
Javon Christian led the way on the mound for Troy in game two’s loss to Florida. Although he let up five runs in his complete game effort, only one of them was earned. Christian struck out 14 batters in the game for Troy.
After falling behind 4-0 heading into the fourth inning, Troy was able to get a run back in the fourth inning when Allen scored on a base hit to left field off the bat of Sanders.
Florida added another run in the top of the sixth inning to give them a little more insurance. Troy was able to get a couple runs in the bottom half of the sixth inning when Sanders hit a two-run homerun scoring Gurba. That would be all the runs Troy was able to score in the sixth inning leading to the Florida win.
Troy’s run came to a close on Monday when they were beat by Georgia 7-4.
Georgia jumped out to an early 3-0 lead in the first. Troy cut their deficit to one when they scored two runs in the bottom of the first inning on a double by Gurba, scoring both Nelson and Allen.
After Georgia extended their lead to 4-2 Troy tied up the game in the third inning when Nelson homered to left scoring Nate Braisted.
That ended up being the final runs scored by Troy on the night and Georgia tacked a run in the fifth followed by two runs in the sixth to knockout Troy.