By Brad Greer

Ryan Maxwell had just about enough of catching 11 innings so he decided to do something about it.

The South Panola senior crushed a 1-1 offering from Horn Lake reliever Justin Pounders over the left field wall in the top of the 11th inning to give the Tigers a 4-3 win Tuesday night in the Oxford Spring Break Tournament. Earlier in the day, the Tigers erased a 7-3 deficit with a five-run fifth inning to take a 9-7 victory over Senatobia.

Maxwell was not the lone contributor of South Panola’s win over Horn Lake however, as three pitchers spun nine scoreless innings in relief to hold the scrappy Eagles in check. Mitchel Babb (2-1) pitched the final two innings to record the win on the mound as the junior left-hander struck out three and walked two batters.

Senior Wesley Gregg got the starting nod on the rubber for the Tigers and gave up three unearned runs in the second inning on three hits and three walks. Joey Gabbard shut down the Horn Lake offense by going 4.1 innings, fanning four on three hits and two walks. Matt Hendrix followed with three shutout innings while giving up one hit and fanning two.

Both teams squandered scoring chances in the late innings of the game as Horn Lake left 12 men on base while South Panola stranded eight runners on the base paths.

In the 10th, Babb doubled off of Pounders to start the inning then advanced to third on a Tays Hardy sacrifice bunt, but the Horn Lake reliever got out of the jam by fanning Gregg and retiring Hendrix on a groundout to end the threat.

The Tigers then put runners on first and second in the eighth only to have Luke Latham bounce into an inning-ending 4-6-3 double play. The Eagles meanwhile put runners on the corners with two outs in the ninth before cleanup hitter Austin Overall flied out to retire the side. Horn Lake put runners on first and third again in the fifth with no outs but could not score as Gabbard wiggled out of the inning on a pickoff, infield groundout and strikeout.

South Panola tied the game at 3-3 in the top of the fifth off Horn Lake starting pitcher Cody Reed as Maxwell led off by reaching on an error.  After Zach Horne  singled to left, Chris Townsend and Babb delivered back-to-back RBI singles to knot the score. Horne, Babb and Townsend had two hits each to lead South Panola at the plate.

The Tigers got on the board in the fourth as Hendrix drew a two-out walk then scored on Latham’s double.

In the first game of the day, Hunter Durham picked up his first varsity win on the mound as the freshmen threw a sparkling 2.1 innings in relief of Tiger starter Bobby Epps. Durham helped his own cause in the fifth by hitting a clutch two-run double to give South Panola a 8-7 lead. Epps surrendered seven runs (six unearned) on six hits in 3.2 innings of work.

Gregg got the fifth inning rally started with a double then came home on an RBI single by Hendrix. After Maxwell popped up for the first out, Latham reached on a walk. Pinch-hitter Taylor Meek slapped a single up the middle to score courtesy runner Blake Darby. Matt Brown followed with a single that plated Latham to trim the Eagle lead to 7-6.

South Panola added a much needed insurance run in the top of the sixth on a two-out RBI single by Latham that scored courtesy runner Hardy from second.

Senatobia took a 4-1 lead in the bottom of the first before the Tigers scored a pair of runs in the third to cut the margin to 4-3 . Gregg led off the inning with a two-out infield single followed by Hendrix’s double. Maxwell then delivered a sharp single to plate Hendrix.

Gregg, Hendrix and Maxwell had two hits each to lead the South Panola 11-hit attack. Lee Self, Brown, Latham, Durham and Meek all registered singles in the win.