BASEBALL: Brammeier's 3 RBI make it a dozen for PCHS
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Pinckneyville baseball continued to roll on Wednesday afternoon, racking up their twelfth victory in a row and solidifying their spot atop the Southern Illinois River-to-River Conference's Mississippi Division.
The 3-1 triumph was the sixth victory of the season for unbeaten Evan Chapman, who allowed just one run, scattering nine hits and two walks with six strikeouts.
"Evan wasn't as sharp as he had been, but he found a way to get outs and keep Carterville off the board for most of the game," said PCHS head baseball coach Alan Engelhardt.
"It was good to see us find a way to win even though we weren't playing our best baseball," he continued. "I thought the rust showed from only playing once in the last week and a half, but we made plays when we needed to. We were pressing a little bit at the plate because we hadn't seen live pitching."
The star at the plate for the Panthers was Marian Brammeier, who was 2-for-3 with a home run and all three runs batted in for Pinckneyville.
In the first, the Lions threatened as Daniel Allen and Logan Mann led off with singles, then Jordan Allensworth lined a double to the outfield. Allen raced home but was gunned out at the plate, then the next two batters went down to retire the side.
Action heated up again in the bottom of the second inning when Brammeier belted an opposite-field homer to right-center field to score Joey Burris and put the Panthers up 2-0 off of Carterville starter Alex Liebenrood.
Brammeier struck again in the sixth, driving in Matthew Nichols with a one-out single while Chapman continued to pitch around offensive threats by the Lions.
Jacob Condor homered to lead off the Lions' seventh, then Allen flied out and Mann went down swinging before Allensworth drew a walk to bring the tying run to the plate in Libenrood. Chapman got him looking to end the threat and the ball game.
Justin Bumann (2-3) joined Brammeier with a pair of hits for PCHS. Burris, Adam Barczewski (2B), Bryant Shute (2B) also reached base with hits. Shute's double in the bottom of the fourth extended his personal hitting streak to eight consecutive games.
Allen (2-4) and Allensworth (2-2, 2 2B, 2 BB) each had multi-hit days for Carterville. Mann, Liebenrood (2B), Conder (HR), Jeff Buritsch, Patrick Brown each had one.
Liebenrood allowed seven hits, two walks and two earned runs in his six innings of work for the Lions, striking out five.
"We just need to get more games in again to find our rhythm," Engelhardt said. "We have put ourselves into the driver's seat in the conference today with two games to play."
Pinckneyville (18-3, 7-1) is at Waltonville on Thursday for a 4:30 p.m. contest.
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