Vero Beach Walks-Off Against Fort Pierce For 9A-7 Championship

The Vero Beach Indians hosted the Fort Pierce Central Cobras Thursday night in the 9A-7 championship game. The Cobras held a two-run lead heading into the bottom of the seventh. However, three runs in the bottom of the seventh, including the walk-off hit from David Luethje, propelled the Indians to a 3-2 win and a district championship.

With time running out, the Indians’ bats finally broke through in the bottom of the seventh. First, with the bases loaded, Matt Mosel was pegged by a pitch and scored Ryan Goodson to pull to within one. They tied the game the very next at-bat when Koa MacDougall worked a walk to bring home Nick Dean from third. Two batters later, Luethje swung at the first pitch he saw and sent a ball hard into center field, scoring Conner Smith for the walk-off, district-championship victory.

The Cobras (9-9) jumped ahead of the Indians in the third inning on a sacrifice from Jacob Harrison that brought home Zach Moen for the 1-0 advantage. The Cobras added to the lead in the top of the sixth when Brett Oliver sent an 0-2 pitch into center field to score Robbie Bingham from second.

Kenrick Mendez started the game for the Cobras and pitched well in the no-decision. Mendez went six innings, allowing two runs on three walks and five hits, while striking out five.

Mendez’ counterpart, Hunter Cooley, went the distance for the Indians (22-2), who ranked as the #1 team in the final PB Rankings of the regular season. Cooley threw 90 pitches over the seven innings, allowing just the two runs, one of which was unearned. Cooley surrendered seven hits but walked no one and struck out four batters.

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