Gray Ange had a feeling of accomplishment late Friday afternoon. His Silverdale Baptist Academy Seahawks rallied from a 4-2 deficit for a six-inning, 14-4 baseball victory over visiting Notre Dame.
And Ainge had proof positive by game's end that his Seahawks had been listening to him and his coaching staff.
"We have been struggling with our two-strike approach, and it's something we did better today," he said. "We got behind (in the count), but we battled and we didn't go down looking. We've been preaching to the guys to put the ball in play and things will happen."
They did that in a morale-busting 11-run fifth inning and then closed out the victory on a single to right field by Peyton Matheny, who went 3-for-4 with two runs scored and two driven in.
Matheny was part of the fifth-inning outbreak, earning a walk and coming around to score.
The outburst was keyed by three Irish errors.
"Our Achilles' heel right now is the big innings," first-year Notre Dame coach Trey Hicks observed. "We can't let a team score 11 runs on some plays we need to make defensively. That's something to work on."
The Irish had seven hits, but their offensive showing was badly overshadowed by their six errors. It's a problem Hicks told the team it needs to address before a big Monday-Tuesday District 7-AA series with Chattanooga Christian.
"We hit the ball well and we hit some hard but right at them, and they made enough plays to win. Defensively we really struggled, and once they got things rolling we couldn't stop the roll," he said. "We're on a four-game skid right now, and it will be interesting to see how the guys react.
"Monday and Tuesday are big games, and the mentality we've shown at the plate is something we need to carry over to the field."
The error binge was at its worst in the fifth. Seahawks leadoff man Tyler Mossburg started the roll with an infield single and stole second. Matheny walked and Alex Gonzalez loaded the bases with a walk. An error allowed one run to score before Blake Howard's double to right brought home two more. Hayden Spencer walked and Dyland Bryant, the right-hander who would earn his third pitching win of the year, singled to right-center to score another runner.
Michael Weiss, who closed out the game for Bryant, chased home two more with a single to left before Colin Lovell and Mossburg reached on back-to-back errors. Matheny got an infield single and Gonzalez earned an RBI with a walk. Sawyer Junkins walked before Howard picked up his third RBI of the inning with a sacrifice fly to center.
Contact Ward Gossett at wgossett@timesfreepress.com or 423-886-4765. Follow him on Twitter @wardgossett.