Olympic Heights Rallies For First Win of the Season

Elijah Rodriguez went 1-for-2 on the night with a home run and four RBIs

Anytime two district opponents get together, the result is usually a hard fought and fierce competition. The situation was no different Friday night when Forest Hill welcomed Olympic Heights for the Lions first district game of the season.

The game did not disappoint for those in attendance as it took extra innings to determine a winner. In the end, Olympic Heights rallied from five runs down at two different points in the game to win 8-7 in nine innings.

“What a game,” Olympic Heights manager Sam Howell said after the come from behind win. “We went back and forth and they jumped on us early. We showed a lot of character in that we didn’t roll over and every game we have gotten better.”

Forest Hill did in fact jump out to a big lead early on in the game, scoring at least two runs in the first three innings. The Falcons manufactured runs through the use of small ball. Sacrifices, stolen bases, and timely hits resulted in a a 5-0 lead after two innings and a 7-2 lead after three. Those two runs in the bottom half of the third would turn out to be the last of the night for Forrest Hill as Olympic Heights settled in and began to chop away at the lead.

Howell brought in Kenny Landis in relief and the senior kept his team in the game. Landis turned in one of his best pitching performances, pitching four and two thirds shutout innings and surrendering only two hits in the process.

“That’s probably one of the best pitching performances I ever had,” Landis said. “I just felt in the zone and focused. After the first inning I got confident and kept going. We had a pretty big deficit and the fact that I could come in, not allow any runs, and leave the door open for us to crawl back in slowly, that’s what you live for.”

It was Landis’s performance on the mound that allowed his team to execute the comeback in dramatic fashion.

While Olympic Heights started their comeback in the third with a two run home run by Elijah Rodriguez, it was the fourth inning that would turn out to be the difference-maker in the game.

The Lions lead off the inning by getting their first four batters on base in order, including an RBI single by Gerry Myers. Rodriguez, fresh off of his two run homer the inning before, came to the plate with the bases loaded and missed a grand slam by just a few feet, but still brought in a run on his sacrifice fly. The sac fly was one of four RBIs on the night for him.

“I just felt in a zone tonight,” Rodriguez said. “I felt it back in the cages before we left to come here {Forrest Hill}. I thought I would do good tonight.”

Forest Hill Manager Russ Milliken discusses strategies with some of his players during a break in the action.

Olympic Heights would bat around in the fourth, scoring four runs in the inning and cutting the deficit down from 7-2 to 7-6. They tacked on another one in the fifth to tie it up, and that is when the chess match truly began.

The two teams swapped zeros for the next three innings as the pitching took over. After playing what amounted to an entire game in center-field, Howell elected to bring Myers in to pitch with two outs in the bottom of the seventh. Myers picked up right where Landis left off, allowing no runs in his two and a third innings of work and surrendering just a single hit, including getting out of a bases loaded jam in the eighth.

“I felt pretty good throwing strikes,” Myers said. “I kept the balls in the strike zone and got guys out and that’s all we needed.”

After trailing for the majority of the night, Olympic Heights took their first lead of the night when it mattered the most in extra innings. Down to their final out in the top of the ninth, Forest Hill elected to intentionally walk Rodriguez. Marco Pinto followed that up with a single to put runners on first and second for Ian Robbins. Robbins reached on an error, which was enough to bring Rodriguez home for what ended up being the game-winning run.

While Forrest Hill was a force to be reckoned with at the plate for most of the night, Manager Russ Milliken knows at the end of the night they just let too many opportunities get away.

“We squandered at lot of opportunities,” Milliken said. “We had some great moments and we had some sad moments. We pretty much gave the game away in the fourth inning. What it comes down to though, is when you get that opportunity to score, you have to score. We had a lot of opportunities and we put seven runs up on the board, but they put up eight.”

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