Thompson battles wind to beat Hoover by 10 in rain-shortened home opener

Published 5:40 pm Wednesday, March 5, 2025

By Andrew Simonson

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By ANDREW SIMONSON | Sports Editor

ALABASTER – Determined to get in a day of baseball before a round of storms came in, the Thompson Warriors and Hoover Buccaneers took the field at Thompson High School and took full advantage of the wild elements on Tuesday, March 4 during Caidyn Harrington Night.

With a strong, steady breeze blowing out to left-center field, Thompson strung together three marathon innings at the plate to score 15 runs. As a result, the Warriors led 15-5 by the time the game was called off due to weather in the bottom of the third with two outs.

However, Hoover was the first one to strike and take a multi-run lead. The Bucs drew walks on the first three batters of the game before Ian Hillary recovered to strike out the next two batters.

That string of strikes didn’t last long as Hoover drew a four-pitch walk to plate the first run of the game. The Bucs then got a two-run single on the next pitch to take the lead to 3-0 before a ground out ended the inning.

Thompson got on the board in the bottom half of the inning after Ma’Kale Holden blasted a ball to the left-center field wall, earning himself a double and scoring Ashton Blair, who had reached second a few pitches ago off a single and wild pitch.

While the next batter struck out, Cooper Mills got hit by a pitch to keep the inning alive. He became the first of six-straight batters to reach base as the entire order came to the plate in the first inning.

Gabe Romero hit an RBI double to cut the deficit to one, and Anderson Harris then drew a walk. Mills scored on a wild pitch before Sabo and Hayden Craycraft also drew walks, the latter of which plated the go-ahead run.

Fuller made it four-straight walks and made the lead 5-3 before Brody Sabo scored to take the lead to 6-3. However, the latter play happened while the Warriors got caught in a run-down between first and second, and Thompson couldn’t get back to first in time before the tag was applied to end the inning.

Hoover drew a walk and a hit by pitch to start the inning before the Warriors outfield got two outs on back-to-back pitches. The Bucs would score shortly after on a wild pitch and an RBI single to cut the deficit to 6-5.

Thompson took advantage of Hoover’s control issues in the bottom of the second. Three of the first four batters reached freely off either walks or by being hit by pitches. An error at short then allowed the Warriors to increase their lead to 8-5.

Thompson got down to two outs on the next batter, but each of the next three batters walked to extend the inning. A bases-loaded walk and a wild pitch took the lead to 10-5 before a Blair RBI single plated Sabo and Craycraft to make it a 12-5 ballgame after two innings that took an hour and a half to complete.

After getting out of a two-on, one-out jam in the top of the third, the Warriors went right back to work in the bottom of the frame. Mills and Romero hit back-to-back singles with one out to bring up Harris, who took the lead to 13-5 with an RBI double.

On the next pitch, Sabo cleared the bases with an RBI single as he increased the advantage to 15-5.

From there, Craycraft drew a walk before Hoover bounced back with a three-pitch strikeout. The game was then called two pitches into Blair’s at-bat due to weather, and the Warriors took the 15-5 win.

Romero went 2-for-3 with three RBI while Blair was 2-for-2 with a walk, two RBI and two runs.

The 10-4 Warriors will continue their stretch of three games in three days when they host Chilton County for senior night on Wednesday, March 5 and the Calera Eagles on Thursday, March 6. Both games will start at 6:30 p.m. at Thompson High School.

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