Ringgold Tigers extra inspired

photo Matthew Crownover will lead the Ringgold Tigers into a rematch today of last year's state-finals series against Columbus High. Staff File Photo.

RINGGOLD, Ga. - Columbus High School can be a very intimidating place to play a baseball game. After all, the Blue Devils have appeared in nine of the past 10 Class AAA championship series, winning four, including last year's two-game sweep of Ringgold.

It will be a different Ringgold team that takes the field today in the start of the teams' second-round playoff series. The players are basically the same - neither team lost much to graduation - but the Tigers now have a different perspective, a different kind of motivation.

Baseball isn't just about winning and losing anymore. The Tigers carry the hopes of an entire area with them.

That in itself can be intimidating for any teenager - and most certainly a distraction - but Ringgold's players have embraced the responsibility of helping their town carry on after a tornado two weeks ago ripped it apart.

"We kind of use it as more motivation than a distraction," senior catcher Caleb Jones said Monday. "We've all pulled together, and hopefully we can give the community a reason to smile."

Added outfielder Reed Walden: "It makes you feel important to the community that they're all rooting for us. It can definitely help put their minds on something positive and forget for a while all that's happened."

An estimated 400 to 500 fans will travel south today to help root on the Tigers. No doubt among them will be residents who lost their homes or their businesses, their jobs or someone they knew or loved. Two Ringgold students were among the eight people whose lives were taken away in seconds.

The Ringgold players had to attend school for the first time Monday since the storm, well aware of those who are gone. Each of them knows someone that has been affected, including one of their own, freshman Slade Dale, who escaped a house that was destroyed.

When they look up into the stands today in the sweltering early-summer heat as they prepare to play a child's game, they will see familiar faces and again be reminded of what they left behind.

"Ringgold's a great community, a great town," junior ace pitcher Matthew Crownover said. "As much as we need them to come out and support us, they need our support, too. They don't have much to look forward to. I mean, when you go home and there's not a roof over your house or your business is closed, or McDonald's is closed and you don't have a job any longer, they need something good, and I hope we can provide that for them."

Coach Brent Tucker would love to end these playoffs with a state championship. The team had previously dedicated the season to the memory of former head coach Bill Womack, who lost a long battle with cancer earlier this year. Womack was a revered member of the community, and though he hadn't coached in more than a decade, each player knew him personally.

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That life lesson was a strong one for the team, but this latest is something, Tucker hopes, that will make the players see life a bit differently.

"Honestly, it's taught them that if you see a need, take the leadership to go help," he said. "As soon as one person steps up, a lot of others will come. I think it's that way in any situation. It gets into the character of the person, and it's something we teach all the time in athletics: If you have adversity, pick yourself back up and keep working hard.

"It shows the character of the people in this community that they aren't going to sit back and just watch. They're doing something about it. When one does, the next does, and before you know it you've got a whole community working to rebuild a town and a school. That's what's truly been amazing."

Ringgold players already have taken the meaning in.

"Until you get something taken away from you, you don't realize how blessed you are," Crownover said. "As bad as this is, it's kind of helped some people put things in perspective. For the town of Ringgold, this [deep playoff] run would be great, phenomenal."

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