Sickles wins second-straight title in battle with East Lake
By Lily Belcher, Correspondent
CITRUS PARK – Senior Caden McDonald stepped up to the plate with two outs in the bottom of the fifth for Sickles. Tied with East Lake at two, the Gryphons were looking for a spark to put them ahead in the Class 6A-District 10 championship. That spark came off a first pitch go-ahead home run by McDonald – his county-leading ninth of the year – as Sickles secured their second-consecutive district championship title Thursday night in a narrow, 3-2 victory at home.
“He’s a video-game cheat code,” said Gryphons coach Eric Luksis about the UCF commit. “He’s as special as they come. He gets it done on both sides of the ball. He’s been fantastic. There aren’t enough adjectives to describe what he does for us on the field.”
McDonald led the Gryphons on the mound for the first six frames and picked up six strikeouts against the Eagles (22-4).
Sickles (24-2) scored first, off an RBI single by Bryce Vance in the bottom of the second. A sacrifice fly to centerfield by Thomas Bly brought in the Gryphons’ second run of the night.
The Eagles answered in the top of the third with an RBI single by Wade Johnson to score Kellen Barrera from third. East Lake tacked on their second run as Daniel Spicher scored off an error to level the score at two in the fourth.
The fifth-inning home run to straight away centerfield by McDonald gave Sickles the lead they needed to secure the championship title.
“We’ve got a bunch of seniors. We’ve got leaders. We’ve got great teammates and it pays off big time in these games,” said Luksis.
But East Lake challenged the Gryphons until the final out.
With one out in the top of the seventh, Barrera advanced to first on an error. Another error put runners on the corners before Barrera was caught in a short rundown between third and home.
“The game went the way we thought it would,” said Eagles coach Zack Roper. “The teams went back and forth. We knew it would be tight. We knew it would be high energy. Both the teams are very similar in the energy they bring to the game.”
Relief pitcher Luke Fikar battled for a strikeout to end the game. Fikar was promptly hoisted into the air by his teammates, before they collapsed into a celebratory dog pile.
“I just learned that this team knows how to win,” said McDonald. “Everybody just contributed and, obviously we had some bad luck with errors, but the team kept fighting, putting up good at bats.”
Since both teams have a high regional ranking, they were both certain they would have a spot in the regional championship tournament. But Thursday night’s victory awarded home-field advantage to Sickles because they won the district title.
“We’re going to kind of stick to our process,” said Luksis about his team’s preparations for Regionals. “We’ve got a process and that process is working. So, we aren’t going to change very much.”
⚾ 6A-10 Final ⚾
#1 Sickles 3, East Lake 2
E 001|100|0 – |2|5|2
S 020|010|x – |3|3|4
W – McDonald (8-1); L – Johnson (7-1); S – Fikar (3)
2B – Barrera, Betchel (E); HR – McDonald (S). Records – E (22-4); S (25-2).
