BASEBALL: Bigham's gem caps off District title for P-DQ
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Cole Bigham allowed just four hits and an unearned run to Orient, helping Pinckneyville-Du Quoin become the champions of the Junior American Legion 25th District Tournament on Wednesday by the score of 3-1. The lefty starter's batterymate Dalton Bigham shared Tournament MVP honors with Orient's Hunter Hancock.
"Cole Bigham did a tremendous job of keeping us in the game," said Posts 2504 & 647 coach Alan Engelhardt. "Our defense did a good job on a few big plays, huge plays in the greater scheme of things."
The away team on the scoreboard, P-DQ initially looked as if they were going to have no problems at the plate in the top of the first against Orient left-hander Braden VanZant. Brian Taylor, A.J. Smith and Joey Burris all had well-hit singles to give 2504/647 a 1-0 lead before the rally died on a 6-4-3 double play two batters later.
"Offensively, it's funny because we took some awful swings, and then we took some great swings at times," Engelhardt said. "That's that consistency thing we keep harping on, but they're kids."
C. Bigham cruised through the first four innings with just one hit allowed, then got a play from his defense when Brendon Shepard gunned out Zeb Goodman at the plate in the fifth to preserve the lead.
D. Bigham singled to lead off Pinckneyville-Du Quoin's sixth, went to second on a ground-out by Nolan Luke, then scored after a pair of passed balls making the score 2-0.
An error put Orient's Cameron Beers on base in the bottom of the inning and Adam Waters singled with one out, but a fine defensive play from Shepard-to-D. Bigham-to-Burris nailed Waters at third base to keep P-DQ ahead 2-1 heading to the seventh.
"If they score two, now you're tied, but I thought we did a good job defensively when we needed to," Engelhardt said, "and obviously Cole threw the heck out of the ball."
Taylor led off with a double and later came in on a passed ball to tack on an insurance run, then C. Bigham pitched around a one-out single in the bottom of the frame to close out the win, and the tournament. Another fine defensive play came to the rescue for P-DQ in the seventh when Justyn Rushing dove to his right for a grounder before tossing to first for the second out to keep the tying run off base.
Burris (3-4, 2B, RBI) had three hits to lead the way for 2504/647 on offense. Taylor (2-4, 2B, 2 R), D. Bigham (1-4, R), Smith (1-4) and Shepard (1-3) also had hits for Pinckneyville-Du Quoin.
Posts 2504 & 647 (30-6) will travel to Vandalia this Saturday for Division Tournament action against Mahomet at 2:30 p.m.
Orient also moves on to Vandalia as a result of their victory over Murphysboro in the losers' bracket final prior to the game with Pinckneyville-Du Quoin.
<element id="paragraph-1" type="body"></element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[ <element id="paragraph-1" type="body"></element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[ <element id="paragraph-1" type="body"></element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[</group><group id="BCB16F2A-BB43-40FF-8371-289362744CD4" type="seoLabels"><seoLabels></seoLabels></group><