Gaston College baseball finishes 2025 season as Region runner-up with 41 victories

Gaston College's baseball team advanced to its second Region 10 Division I tournament championship game in three years with a come-from-behind win on Monday before falling in Tuesday morning's championship game to No. 9-ranked Florence Darlington Tech.

"At the end of the day, we were beat up and knew we were beat up," Rhinos coach Shohn Doty said of his team. "It's been an injury-plagued year. So, to finish the year 41-15-1 and be runner-up in the region to a team that's probably going to the World Series for the third time in five years and fourth time in eight years, I was proud of my kids."

In Monday's elimination game, Gaston College trailed 2-1 after 2 1/2 innings and were tied at 7-all after 4 1/2 innings before its second five-run inning of the day in the sixth led to the comfortable 13-7 victory.

In a contest that lasted 3 1/2 hours, Rhinos' batters had 12 hits, 14 walks and three hit batters against 10 USC Union pitchers.

Sam Dansky (2 hits), Koy Swanson (2 hits, double, 1 RBI), Nick Lundquist (2 hits, home run, 4 RBIs), Joey Nicholson (2 hits, double) and Chris Hendrickson (2 hits, home run, 5 RBIs) led a balanced offensive attack.

Starter and winner Noah Zimmerman (6 innings, 10 strikeouts), Cross Clayton (2 innings, 6 strikeouts) and Jake Young (1 innings, 1 strikeouts) handled the pitching duties.

On Tuesday, the Rhinos fell behind early before losing 19-8 to the Stingers. With the win, Florence Darlington Tech (49-9) hosts this weekend's best-of-three East District championship series against Harford, Md.

Nick Lundquist (3 hits, double, 4 RBIs), David Nicks (2 hits) and Koy Swanson (2 hits, 1 RBI) led an 11-hit Gaston College.

Earlier in the tournament, Gaston College had eight players selected to the All-Region 10 team and two players honored on the All-Defensive team.

Pitcher Conner Frail and infielder Brandon Crabtree were first team All-Region 10, pitchers Noah Zimmerman and Daniel Parris, catcher Jackson Toberman, infielder David Nicks and outfielders Koy Swanson and Chris Hendrickson were second team selections with Nicks (third base) and Nicholson (outfield) named to the All-Defensive team.

"I thought it was real fair assessment of our players," said Doty, whose program has gone 185-45-1 in the last four seasons with four consecutive 40-win seasons. "Give credit to our guys for improving. One of the goals of our program is to help kids better. They did that and we'll keep doing that."