In a series that has seen more than its fair share of thrillers, Junction City and Woodlawn staged another classic with the stakes at their highest.
Gabe Richard hit a go-ahead RBI triple in the fourth and Keelan Hodge and T.J. Bale collaborated on a three-hitter, as the Dragons outlasted the Bears 2-1 to win the 2A state title Friday at Baum-Walker Stadium in Fayetteville.
The state title is the ninth for the Dragons (30-8) in their storied history.
The South’s top seed, Junction City ends the season with a 10-game winning streak, their second double-digit winning streak of the season following a 12-game tear than spanned March and April.
The Dragons also capped a perfect postseason run by winning all nine of their games in the district, regional and state tournaments.
Overall, Junction City won 22 of its final 24 games.
The Bears (23-9), the South’s No. 3 seed, were denied in their bid to join Pine Bluff (1983-86) and Fayetteville (2006-09) as schools that had won four consecutive state titles, a streak that began in 2016 against Junction City.
The meeting between the 8-2A rivals was their third this year, and it followed the script of many past games by being a tightly-contested affair.
The Bears, who had been shut out in 7-0 and 1-0 losses to the Dragons in the previous two games, scored a run in the second to take a 1-0 lead.
Nick Maynard, who nearly matched Bale pitch for pitch two weeks ago in the 1-0 loss in the semifinals of the regional tournament, kept the Dragons at bay early on, but Junction City answered in the fourth.
Jack Smith was hit by a pitch and Chase Wood entered the game as a pinch runner.
Charles Hoof followed with a fly ball to right, but two Woodlawn defenders collided going after the ball, resulting in Wood taking third and Hoof advancing to second.
Tanner McLelland then hit a fly ball to center that was deep enough for Wood to score the tying run.
That set the stage for Richard, who laced his aforementioned triple to left to score Hoof to give the Dragons a 2-1 lead.
Hodge, the game’s MVP, departed after walking five and striking out nine while allowing just two hits and a run in six innings of work.
But the Bears did not go down without a fight in the seventh.
Woodlawn had runners at first and second with two outs and Nick Ward, who was 6-for-8 with a home run and eight RBIs in the first two games of the state tournament, at the plate.
On the first pitch, Bale got Ward to hit a tapper in front of the plate that catcher Bryce Ware pounced on to throw out the senior to end the game.
Bale walked one and allowed one hit to pick up the save.
“What a game,” said Junction City coach Joe Paul Hammett. “A super job by our players and coaches. It was pretty special coming against one of our big rivals that beat us in 2016.”
Ware had a double and a single to finish with seven hits in the state tournament.
The bottom of Junction City’s lineup continued its outstanding work in the state tournament, as McLelland’s RBI was his third to go along with four hits, and Richard finished the state tournament with four hits and four RBIs.