Sussex Central's baseball team today (Thursday) won its quarterfinal bout with A.I. duPont 10-6 and moved on to a semifinal game with Salesianum slated for Saturday. Sussex Tech's baseball squad, however, fell to top seed Middletown 4-3 and saw its season end. Over on the softball diamond, No. 10 seed Milford's Cinderella run continued with a semifinal victory over the Lady Knights.
Central baseball never trailed the Tigers in the bout, but the 11th-seeded visitors did make the game interesting in the top half of the sixth inning when they closed to within 6-5 of the No. 3 Golden Knights.
The Knights, however, rebounded from the poor showing in the top half of the frame with four runs during their plate appearance to take a 10-5 advantage, and even though the Tigers loaded the bases with no outs to start the seventh, freshman pitcher Connor Cooper got out of the jam to give Central its first trip to the final four in eight years.
Cooper also had a big hit at the plate during his only at bat of the tilt, as he accounted for two of the four runs in the sixth inning rally with a base knock.
No. 2 seed Salesianum, which knocked off rival St. Elizabeth 1-0 today, awaits the Knights in Saturday's semifinal bout that has still not been given a date and time.
Sallies bested Central 10-0 when the teams met in the regular season, but a different pitching matchup from that contest will likely ensue on Saturday.
The Knights' cross-town rival Sussex Tech did not fare as well today, as it saw its season end when No. 1 seed Middletown broke a 3-3 tie in the bottom half of the last inning to advance to its semifinal game with No. 5 St. Mark's.
On the softball diamond in a semifinal bout, No. 3 Central could not get its offense going while Milford's bats never quit in a 12-1 Lady Bucs win.
