Carter Whittington hit .415 last season after batting .508 in 2021.
Caldwell County and Heritage Christian Academy had to wait an extra four days for their first-ever meeting on the baseball diamond.
When they finally hooked up Friday night in a 2nd Region All A Classic quarterfinal contest in Princeton, the homestanding Tigers put up an eight-spot in the bottom of the fifth inning to capture a 10-2 victory.
Caldwell (6-3) advances to a semifinal contest against Lyon County. That game, originally set to be played at Fort Campbell, will instead take place in Eddyville Saturday afternoon at 4:00.
Heritage Christian (11-2) looked good early against Caldwell. Trenton Hayes no-hit the Tigers for four innings as the visiting Warriors took a 2-0 lead.
But the Caldwell offense finally got rolling in the bottom of the fifth. The Tigers sent 12 men to the plate in that frame while completely changing the momentum of the contest.
Luke Parker’s two-run single to left tied the game at 2-2 with one out. Parker later scored on a wild pitch to put the Tigers up 3-2.
Logan Smiley tripled home another run with a long fly ball to right-center. Brady Holeman and Jamus Carneyhan had infield singles that drove in runs. Holeman later came in on a wild pitch.
Hunter Newsom added an RBI double to extend the margin to 8-2.
Caldwell tacked on two more runs in the sixth, scoring once on an error then getting an RBI single to left from Cole Slone.
That was more than enough offense for Ben Goodaker (4-0), who went the distance on the mound for the Tigers.
Goodaker allowed two earned runs on just four base hits. He struck out 10 and walked three while throwing 119 pitches.
Newsom finished 2-for-3 at the plate for Caldwell while Slone and Carneyhan were each 2-for-4.
Weston Powell was 1-for-2 for Heritage Christian and picked up both RBIs for the Warriors — on a sacrifice fly to center in the first inning and a two-out single to center in the third.
The game was originally scheduled to be played on Monday. It was rescheduled as part of a doubleheader at Crittenden County on Tuesday, only to be rained out again and then set for Thursday. The teams finally got the game in between rain storms on Friday at the VFW Ballpark.
