In Tuesday night’s game against Linden, the 12-year-old Demopolis all-stars came out strong and didn’t look back.

Tripp Perry earned the win, pitching three scoreless innings.

“Tripp’s a leader. He wanted the ball tonight. He just pitched like he had something to prove,” said 12U head coach Rob Pearson.

Perry got some early run support from his teammates. Justin Sanders led off Demopolis’s half of the first inning by getting hit by a pitch. Ryan Schroeder brought him in with a double and scored himself on a passed ball.

The second inning, however, is where Demopolis really did its damage.

The 12-year-olds took advantage of walks and timely hits to put four runs across the plate to give Perry and the rest of the pitchers breathing space from which to work.

“Blake Bowden gave us two solid innings (pitching), and Steven Stewart came in to close it out,” said Pearson.

Being able to keep arms fresh will be the key to continuing further down the road.

Schroeder lead the 12-year-olds hitting on the night with two doubles and three RBIs.

Game one for the 12 year olds was a lot tighter than the end result showed. Demopolis struggled with Sumter County for five innings before finally pulling away in the last frame.

“We didn’t come out of the gate hitting well, but they didn’t get down on themselves,” said Pearson.

The game was a pitching duel from the early stages, with good defense from both sides keeping the game close. The bats for each side were kept quiet in the early stages other than Perry, who had a monster day hitting. He went 4-for-5 with two doubles, a home run and six RBIs. Perry also came in and shut down Sumter’s biggest scoring threat of the night. Protecting a 3-1 lead, Perry came in to take down Sumter’s best hitter in Jeremy Hines to get Demopolis out of the inning.

“Heath (Stanford) pitched fantastic. He gave us everything we needed and Tripp was able to come in and shut them down. That was the turning point,” said Pearson.

It may have just been the turning point because after that, two errors from Sumter’s third baseman lead to another Demopolis run.

Following an uneventful bottom of the fifth, Demopolis came out and put the game away with a five-hit, nine-run inning that saw 13 batters step to the plate.  

The 12-year-olds will travel to Butler Wednesday night as they continue pool play in District 10.