By Dustin Kent

Published: March 14, 2008

MALONE — Graceville broke a 2-2 tie with two runs in the top of the seventh inning to take a 4-2 district win over Malone Friday night.
Graceville carried a 2-0 lead into the sixth inning before Malone tied it up with a two-run double by Blake Henson off of Stephen Burdeshaw, who came on in relief of starter Josh Taylor.

Chase Ivey got Graceville started in the top of the seventh with a hard-hit single to center field.

Ivey then made it to second after Malone failed to catch him in a rundown between first and second.

A single by Burdeshaw to left preceded a ground ball to shortstop by Justin Miles, resulting in a force out at second that allowed Ivey to come home.

Two batters later, Burdeshaw came around to score on a Malone fielding error.

Burdeshaw settled in on the mound in the bottom of the frame, striking out Derek Welch, inducing a fly out to Justin Bryan and catching Kevin Warren looking to end the game.

“That was a tough one,” Graceville coach Mike Carter said after the game. “It seems like it’s like that every time we play (Malone).”

Graceville improved to 6-5 on the season.

Burdeshaw picked up the win, though Taylor was excellent in the starting role, going 5 2/3 innings and giving up two earned runs, while striking out four.

“Josh pitched very well,” Carter said. “He’s a kid we trust to put on the mound.”

Graceville gave Taylor an early lead when Burdeshaw walked in the first inning and scored on an errant throw to second by the Malone catcher to make it 1-0.
Burdeshaw scored again in the third inning off of another Malone error to give Taylor a 2-0 lead to work with.

It was more than Taylor needed through the first four innings, as the 5-foot-9-inch senior allowed just five baserunners and no hits before the fifth inning.

“(Taylor) did a good job and kept us off balance,” Malone coach Max Harkrider said after the game. “But we can do a lot better than that and we’ll have to do a lot better.”

Harkrider’s issues with his team extended beyond failing to come up with big hits.

In the fifth and sixth innings, Malone made crucial baserunning errors that killed or limited Tiger rallies.

Malone had runners on second and third with two out in the fifth when Raymond Bentley wandered too far off of second and was picked off by Taylor to end the inning.

After Warren and Aaron Conrad started the sixth inning with hits to place themselves on second and third with none out, Trevor Blackburn hit sharp grounder to shortstop and Warren found himself caught in a rundown and thrown out at home plate.

Derek Orshall followed Blackburn to the plate and sent the first pitch he saw into left field for the second out of the inning before Henson tied the game.

“I’m just disappointed with our mistakes, especially our baserunning,” Harkrider said of the game. “We’re going to have to start back at the drawing board.”

Malone is now 1-1 in district play, while Graceville improves to 3-0 with wins over Bethlehem and Poplar Springs already in hand.

Carter, however, isn’t ready to crown his team district king just yet.

“It’s a good way to start, but we started this way last season and ended up third in district,” the coach said. “We’re not sitting on our laurels at all.”