BASEBALL: P'ville-DQ Senior Legion stays alive
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[With their backs against the wall and their bench seemingly getting thinner by the game, Pinckneyville-Du Quoin's Senior American Legion baseball team showed up in Metropolis to play at 9:30 a.m. for the second straight day on Tuesday. Unlike Monday morning's heartbreaking defeat, Posts 2504 & 647 came out on the winning end of a lopsided 14-1 thumping of Albion to stay alive in the 5th Division Tournament.
Dillon Meier hurled all seven innings on the mound for 2504/647, allowed just three hits and a walk and struck out ten Post 590 hitters for the victory.
"(Meier) only had one walk, that helped us," said Derek Beninati, head coach of Pinckneyville-Du Quoin, "and we didn't make any errors, so we played a pretty good game and took care of business today."
Bryant Shute was hit by a pitch with one out in the top of the first and advanced to third on a double by Brandon George before Craig Dahlman sacrificed him in for a 1-0 lead.
More damage was done in the third after Bryce Harre and Shute walked to lead off the inning, then George was plunked with a pitch to lead the bases. Dahlman flew out to second base, and with one out, Seth Baxter singled to center for a pair of runs batted in. Harre and Shute came up again with two outs in the fourth, and both launched solo homers for a 5-0 advantage for 2504/647.
Brandon Long brought in Baxter and Marian Brammeier with his double in the fifth, then Harre drove in Long and Taylor Beninati to make it 9-0.
Meanwhile on the other side of the ball, Meier was sailing along with only one hit allowed until the sixth when he allowed a solo homer for Albion's only run of the game. The righty retired eight in a row on two separate occasions and struck out at least one batter in every inning but the seventh.
Harre, Shute, Dahlman, Baxter and Noah Hepp all had hits during a five-run seventh inning for Pinckneyville-Du Quoin before the game ended due to the mercy rule.
"We came out ready to play this morning," Beninati said. "We got our bats going and hit the ball a lot better today."
Eight batters had hits for Pinckneyville-Du Quoin led by Harre (3-4, 3 R, 3 RBI, 2 2B, HR, BB) and Baxter's (3-4, 2 R, 4 RBI, 2B, HBP) three-hit efforts. Shute (2-3, 4 R, 2 RBI, HR, BB, HBP), George (2-2, R, 2B, 2 BB, HBP), Dahlman (1-4, R, 2 RBI, 2B, SAC), Brammeier (2-5, R), Hepp (2-4, RBI, 2B) and Long (1-5, R, 2 RBI, 2B) completed the hitting rundown for 2504/647.
Up next for Pinckneyville-Du Quoin will be a familiar foe, Marion Post 147, which lost to Belleville on Tuesday to fall into the 4:30 p.m. game on Wednesday with 2504/647. The winner stays alive and plays at 7:00 p.m. on Thursday night in Metropolis.
Hepp, who handled the catching duties on Tuesday during Adam Barczewski's one-game suspension, will take the hill for P'ville-Du Quoin. Hepp last pitched Friday, July 8 during the District Tournament where he fanned 17 hitters during a 4-hit shutout of Orient.