The Hagerstown baseball team hosted Richmond in a nonconference game on Thursday, April 2, at Lloyd Michael Field. Both teams were coming off wins over Connersville earlier in the week.
The Tigers sent junior Nick Tinkle to the mound while Richmond countered with senior Jayvian Burdette. The Red Devils scored in their first at bat. Logan Belanga, who was hit by a pitch, eventually scored on an RBI double from Dominick McKinley to give the Devils a quick 1-0 lead.
When the Tigers came to bat in the bottom of the second inning, the Devils were still clinging to their 1-0 lead, but just about anything that could go wrong for the Red Devils did. The first three Tiger batters, Kaden Hall, Tinkle and Jack Rector, drew walks to load the bases.
Fletcher Callahan was hit by a pitch to drive in a run. Gaige Howard hit a ground ball and the Devils threw Tinkle out at home for their first out, leaving Howard at first on a fielder’s choice. Braydon Sanders drew a walk to reload the bases, bringing about a Richmond pitching change.
Syn’Cere Russell walked Jaxon Hale to score a run and surrendered back-to-back singles to Graham Vinson and Zack Logston, who both eventually scored. Hall drove in the sixth run in the inning with a sacrifice fly.
Corey Day led off the top of the third inning for the Red Devils with a single, but he was thrown out trying to steal second base and the next two batters went down via ground out and strikeout.
Rector led off the bottom of the fourth inning with a home run. Callahan singled, Howard walked and Sanders drew a walk to load the bases bringing about another Richmond pitching change. Cameron Rodriquez came on and quickly extinguished the Tiger threat, leaving the Tigers with a 10-1 lead after four innings.
The Red Devils added a single run in the top of the fifth inning, but the Tigers came back to score two runs in the bottom of the sixth inning off Darin Candlish, the fourth Richmond pitcher to appear, who took a 12-2 lead and ended the game.
The Red Devils were limited to four base hits. McKinley’s double was their only hit for extra bases. The Tigers had six hits. Rector led the way with two hits, including a home run.
Tinkle was the winning pitcher, and Heath Johnson pitched in relief. Burdette suffered the loss.
Richmond head coach Mike Medley said that it was tough for his team to come down to earth after beating Connersville the day before.
“This game had a disappointing outcome,” Medley said. “The situation that we put ourselves in in the second inning was hard to come back from. We may have ridden the high of beating Connersville last night and didn’t focus tonight.”
“Cameron Rodriquez is a kid we are really high on. He came in and gave us a great effort, but we were already facing a big deficit when he came in. I think we expected to come in here and get an easy win and obviously that was not the case. I like this team. I look forward to the rest of the season. We have the potential to be very good.”
Hagerstown head coach Jay Hale said he was happy with his team.
“We knew that Nick Tinkle would give us good effort on the mound,” he said. “When we scored six runs in the second, we were in good shape and we were able to finish with a win. We are hitting well and making defensive plays. I am proud of our effort.”
Hagerstown (3-0) 0 6 1 3 0 2 12
Richmond (1-1) 1 0 0 0 1 0 2
Hagerstown hits: Callahan, Logston, Rector (2), Sanders, Vinson
Richmond hits: Brown, Day, McKinley, Darwyn Roman
A version of this article appeared in the April 8 2026 print edition of the Western Wayne News.