After splitting the first two games of its opening playoff series with Fontainebleau, both of which went down to the wire, Destrehan left no doubt Saturday afternoon.
The Wildcats are moving on to the second round after a dominating 12-w victory at home in the third and deciding game of the best of three series, winning in five innings by the 10-run rule.
“That’s what I hoped and expected to see from our club today,” said Destrehan head baseball coach Chris Mire. “It wasn’t the prettiest postgame talk yesterday, even though we got the win, because we knew we expect more from ourselves. Today’s performance is what we expect. It’s what we’ve been seeing the past month.
“I love this group, win or lose. They do everything the right way. They stay together. We have a lot of fun. I thought we let it all hang out today and did what we came here to do, and I couldn’t be more proud.”
No. 14 seeded Destrehan (25-12) advances to face No. 3 West Monroe in the second round. Game one of that best of three series will be Thursday at 6 p.m. at West Monroe. The two teams faced off early in the regular season, a 6-2 Destrehan win on Feb. 20.
Chase Mire and Chase Marcotte each homered in the game, the first and second hitters in the lineup piling up production at the top of the Destrehan order. Mire went 3-for-4 with three RBIs and two runs scored. Marcotte was 2-for-4 with three RBIs and a run scored. Derek Lucas went 2-for-2 with two runs scored. Brady Carter doubled and drove in two runs and Josh Muller went 2-for-3 with a run scored and RBI. Lucas and Champ White each stole three bases.
“There’s a reason the two of them are at the top of our lineup,” said Chris Mire. “They’ve both been through this multiple times, the most experienced guys on our club. They were both mad at themselves yesterday because they had opportunities to put that game away and didn’t. And for both of those guys to step up the way they did – they started it for us right off the bat. Two great captains.”
Brody Fairleigh started and earned the win, going 4.2 innings and allowing an earned run on seven hits and a walk. He struck out two.
“(After Chase Mire and Marcotte) Brody was our next most experienced starter with four or five starts on the year, and kind of flies under the radar beyond the guys who have more innings. He showed during the summer that he’s a great competitor,” Chris Mire said. “We asked him to give us one inning, then we asked him to give us one more, and we kept going. I thought he did a great job, giving us exactly what we needed today.”
It didn’t take long for Destrehan to assert control. Mire led off the bottom of the first inning with a single. Then Marcotte deposited the first pitch of the next at bat over the wall with a big swing, his home run making it 2-0.
“This whole weekend, I’d been letting off too big a swing. I shortened it up, and I finally got the pitch I’ve been hunting for all weekend and put a good swing on it,” Marcotte said.
After that blast, Destrehan went in the opposite direction to score its next few runs – the Wildcats played some small ball, and it led to a huge inning.
White walked and Larry Rodrigue singled him in to make it 3-0. Lucas, who reached on a bunt single, scored from third on Brady Carter’s bunt to make it 4-0. Muller’s bunt led to a pair of Bulldog errors and two more Destrehan runs, and the Wildcats led 6-0 after an inning.
Jaxson Hill’s RBI double in the second inning got Fontainebleau on the board for the first time on the day, but Destrehan answered when Champ White stole home in the bottom half of the inning to push the lead back to 7-1.
In the bottom of the fourth, Mire led off with a solo homer to make it an 8-1 game.
“I actually thought it was going to be a double,” he said. “But I got a fastball to hit and hit it out.”
Leading 9-2 in the bottom of the fifth, Destrehan finished things off on an RBI double by Carter, two-RBI single by Mire and an RBI single by Marcotte that clinched the win.
Destrehan lost the first game of the series and trailed 3-0 in the fifth inning of game two before rallying back to win and force game three.
“It just shows the toughness of this team. We fight for each other every day,” said Chase Mire.
Marcotte called it a first step.
“It feels great because we put in hours and hours of hard work … it’s great but this isn’t our end goal. Our goal is to make it to state and then to win state,” Marcotte said.
