The Hagerstown baseball team hosted Northeastern on Saturday, May 17, in a game played on Lloyd Michael Field, but Northeastern was deemed the home team. A Tiger victory meant clinching the outright conference title. A Knight victory meant that the Tigers would be forced to share the league title with Knightstown. The Tigers were not in a sharing mood.
Both teams went with their best. The Tigers sent senior Kaagen Kendall to the mound, and the Knights countered with senior Kaiden White. In a battle between two rivals, Hagerstown only allowed a Northeastern player to reach second base twice during the contest.
The Tigers loaded the bases in the top of the first inning, but Kaiden White stranded all three runners to end the threat. Neither team had another runner until Kaiden White led off the bottom of the second inning with a single, but he was picked off in a steal attempt.
The Tigers got on the scoreboard in the top of the third inning when Aiden Grover smacked a two-out home run to give the Tigers a lead they would never surrender. Neither team scored again until the Tigers exploded for four runs in the top half of the fifth inning. Will King hit a one-out double, and Graham Vinson followed with an RBI double to bring about a pitching change. Kaiden White gave way to his twin brother Logan White.
An RBI single from Will Combs and a two-RBI single from Kaden Hall pushed the lead to 5-0. The Tigers scored two more runs in the top of the seventh when Vinson doubled, Grover reached on an error and Hall drove them both home with a single.
The White brothers scattered 10 hits and combined to strike out eight. Kendall surrendered three hits and struck out six.
Vinson collected three hits for the Tigers. Combs, Grover and Hall each supplied two hits.
Knight head coach Dave Baker gave credit to Hagerstown. “They did not give us much to work with,” Baker said. “They played well and we could not hit the ball.”
Tiger head coach Jay Hale complimented his pitcher and his opponent. “When (Kaagen) Kendall is on, he is hard to beat,” Hale said. “He was on today, and we beat a very good team.”
Hagerstown (12-7, 8-0 TEC) 0 0 1 0 4 0 2 7
Northeastern (11-6, 4-3 TEC) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Hagerstown hits: Combs (2), Grover (2), Hall (2), King, Vinson (3) — Northeastern hits: Riley Isaacs, Jarrett Leitner, Kaiden White
A version of this article appeared in the May 21 2025 print edition of the Western Wayne News.