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RUTLEDGE – Tuesday’s game between Grainger and Claiborne was a pitching battle between Brady Smith and Joseph Houser.

Smith was his usual brilliant self as he struck out 15 Claiborne batters and walked only one. He also only gave up one hit but it was a big one: a two-run homer to Houser that gave the Bulldogs the lead in the fourth inning. Houser pitched well with eight K’s and only one earned run but the Grizzlies were able to rally late to take a 5-3 win.

Both pitchers were dealing through the first two innings. Grainger finally broke through in the bottom of the third when Kade Lucas, who has made the most of his time batting lead-off in the lineup, singled to right field to score Conner May. Lucas later scored on a wild pitch to make it 2-0, Grizzlies.

The Bulldogs took the lead in the top of the fourth when Ty Pryse reached on an error that allowed Dylan Foster to score. With a runner on board, Houser hit a towering homer to right field that put Claiborne ahead 3-2. That’s how things stood until the bottom of the fifth when the Grizzlies tied the game at 3-3. Braylnn Christian hit a sacrifice fly to center field that brought home Lucas from third base.

Grainger went up 5-3 when Ryland Burchett singled to score Jaxon Maxey and then Lucas was able to cross the plate on an error in the infield. Bryson Bennett got the win as he relieved Smith after 5.2 innings and had one strikeout in the final one and a third innings.

“We didn’t play very well at all,” Grainger head coach Garrett Yates said. “I think it goes back to the fact that everyone thinks Brady is going to do it all and I think we thought that since we beat them 8-1 (on Monday) that we are going to win easily since Brady was pitching. Claiborne is not a bad baseball team and if you think that we can just show up and win, you have to be a supreme talent if you are going to sleepwalk through games and we sleepwalked through this game and was lucky to win. That’s our fault as coaches of not getting them ready or firing them up.”

“Brady threw it well and Kade Lucas is just hitting the cover off the ball right now,” Yates continued. “I think we have figured something out with him at the top of the lineup wiht him getting on base like he is. Hopefully that will allow us to score some more runs.”

“Joseph came out and threw a great game today and we couldn’t ask for anything better,” Claiborne assistant coach Matt Bussell said. “He got up in his pitch count and we had to take him out. In the first time through the lineup, we had eight of nine strikeouts but the second time through, we made contact and got a runner on and Joseph was able to hit one out. We gave up two runs in the bottom of the sixth inning and weren’t able to recover from that.”