No. 7 Gaston College impressive as it extends its winning streak to 14 games

With the start of the second half of the Region 10 schedule looming, No. 7 Gaston College's baseball team continued its stellar play with Tuesday's 11-0, 7-inning victory over Roane State Community College, Tenn., at Gastonia's Sims Legion Park.

The Rhinos improved to 33-2 overall as its prepares to play a three-game series at No. 8 Florence Darlington Tech this weekend.

"It's not hard to get them motivated to play at Florence," Gaston College coach Shohn Doty said after his team won its 14th straight games. "We're going to take tomorrow off and get in two practices and keep working.
"There's a lot of season left but we're where we want to be. I'm excited to get into the second half of the season and keep the momentum going."

Hot-hitting Caden Davidson drove in the first run with a RBI double in a two-run first inning, then later added a solo home run in the third and a two-run home run in the fourth.

"It's pretty impressive to watch right now," Doty said of Davidson, who had three hits, one walk and four RBIs in his four plate appearances. "He's hitting good pitches and not missing them."

Davidson led a nine-hit offense that also got production from Logan Ponnett (2 hits), Joey Nicholson (2 doubles, 2 RBIs), Nick Diehl (double, 2 RBIs) and Gabe Simmons (1 hit, 2 RBIs).

On the mound, starter and winner Zach Kimmel (2 innings, 5 strikeouts) was the first of six pitchers who combined on a two-hitters; Relievers Cross Clayton (1 inning), Gavin Aldredge (1 inning, 2 strikeouts), Julian Arreola (1 inning), Terry Kaler (1 inning, 1 strikeout) and Chase Ghantt (1 inning, 2 strikeouts) finished up the shutout.

"On the mound, we used six guys and it was good to see all of them do well," Doty said. "We're going to have to have that depth to do as well as we hope."

After Saturday's 1 p.m. doubleheader and Sunday's 1 p.m. game at Florence Darlington Tech, the Rhinos will be off until a three-game series at USC Sumter April 3 and 4.