Northeast outscored Jones College 12-4 over the final five innings and posted a 14-8 victory here Thursday evening at The Plex in Game 1 of their Region 23 Best-of-Three playoff series.
Game two will be played at 3 p.m. Friday with a third game, if necessary, slated for 2 p.m. Saturday. Jones is now 33-16 and the Tigers are 32-19.
Jones led 3-0 after two innings and 6-2 going into the bottom of the fifth. But the Tigers scored three in the fifth, six in the sixth, one in the seventh and two in the eighth to pull away from the Bobcats.
Hays Carley (Columbia Academy) had a two-run home run for Jones. Gatlin Sanders (Madison Central), Tristan Pearson (Biloxi) and Marquette Gibson (D’Iberville) each doubled and singled with Josh Cary (Petal) and Beau Bryans (Madison Central) each getting two singles. Chase Honeycutt (DeSoto Central) doubled with Jakob Wax (Prairieville, Louisiana) adding a two-run single.
Drew Druckenmiller (Mobile, Alabama) started and went the first five innings, allowed five runs, eight hits, four walks and posted eight strikeouts. Eli Walker (Gulfport) pitched .1 inning and got the loss, giving up three runs, one hit, one walk and one hit batsman. Kace Matthews (West Jones), Francisco Elvira (West Jones) and Blake Summerlin (Vancleave) also pitched for Jones.
Lock Elliott homered twice and drove in seven runs for the Tigers. Peyton Peoples homered and doubled for NEMCC.
Taylor Ballard went 1.2 innings in relief and got the win. He allowed one run, two hits and walked three. Starter Matthew Ballard went 5.1 innings, allowed seven runs (six earned), 10 hits, walked three and struck out six.
