Heading into the tournament hopes were high of capturing 1st place in the post season tournament as well, however, a first round contest with North Middle School on Thursday night proved to be an initial setback as the Wildcats lost 6 – 2. Tullahoma managed only 4 scattered hits, 1 of which was a solo homerun by Brandon Weddington. The other 3 came from Alex Butaud, Zach Lampkin and Jordan Sheffield. The Tullahoma pitching staff of Weddington and Sam Tomes allowed only 4 hits as well, but errors, a couple of walks, and timely hitting by North was more than Tullahoma could over come.

The loss sent Tullahoma into the loser’s bracket where the road to winning the championship would mean winning 1 game on Friday and 4 games on Saturday.

Friday evening the Wildcats faced off against Harris Middle School who had lost to Warren County. The final score of this one saw Tullahoma moving on with a 17 – 6 win. A 9 run 2nd inning put the Cats in control of this one. The pitching staff of Justin Brown, Michael Shipp and Alex Butaud held Harris to only 3 hits. Leading the way offensively was Sam Tomes with 3 hits, 3 RBI’s, Alex Butaud 2 hits, 2 RBI’s, Brandon Weddington 2 hits, 4 RBI’s, Trey Burks with 1 hit, 2 RBI’s, Justin Brown 1 hit, 3 RBI’s, Michael Shipp with 1 hit, 2 RBI’s, Jordan Sheffield had 2 hits and Zach Lampkin had 1 hit.

Saturday morning theWildcats began what they hoped would be a full day of baseball consisting of 4 games. Their first opponent was Coffee County who had lost to Warren County. The Wildcats won this one 6 – 1. Brandon Weddington, Jordan Sheffield, and Sam Tomes combined to only allow 2 hits. Offensively, Tullahoma banged out 12 hits. 3 by Tomes, 2 by Burks, 2 by Sheffield and 1 RBI, 1 from Butaud and 1 RBI, 1 from Weddington and 2 RBI’s, 1 from Scottie Maupin and 2 RBI’s,1 from Zach Lampkin, and 1 from Zane Price.

Next up for Tullahoma was Warren County who lost to North. The victory by North put them into the Championship game. They would wait and play the winner of this one. It didn’t take long for Tullahoma’s hot bats to put this one out of reach as the Wildcats rolled to a 15 – 4 victory. Tullahoma had 17 hits, including Alex Butaud going 3 for 3 with a 2 run Homerun and 6 RBI’s, and Brandon Weddington capping off the scoring with his 2nd Homerun of the tournament with a runner on base in the 5th inning. Trey Burks went 4 for 4 from the plate including a triple and had 3 RBI’s. Sam Tomes had 3 hits and an RBI, Zane Price had 2 hits as did Justin Brown. Scottie Maupin and Jordan Sheffield contributed a hit a piece. Brown and Zach Lampkin combined on the mound allowing 6 hits.

The Championship game was a re-match of Thursday’s nights game. Tullahoma needed the win over North to force a final decisive game. Tullahoma got the spark they needed when Zach Lampkin hit a 2 run Homerun to tie the game at 3 in the 4th inning. The Wildcats added 1 more in the 5th and 2 more in the 7th to post a 6 – 4 victory. The Tullahoma pitching staff of Brandon Weddington, Alex Butaud, Zach Lampkin and Sam Tomes allowed 7 hits. The TMS offense posted 9 hits of their own. Trey Burks had 3, Butaud 1 and an RBI, Weddington 2 and an RBI, Tomes with 1, Maupin with 1, Jordan Sheffield had the other 2 RBI’s.

Tullahoma had battled back and took the long road to get back in position to win the tournament. A final decisive game was needed between TMS and North. At the end of the night Tullahoma found themselves on the short side of an 8 -7 final. It was 8 – 4 going into the 5th inning when Tullahoma managed to plate 3 and make it an 8 – 7 score with 2 innings left to play. However, North, behind some good defense, did not allow another Wildcat base runner. Tullahoma pitchers Sam Tomes, Justin Brown, and Jordan Sheffield held North to only 5 hits. The Wildcats had 7 hits. 2 from Alex Butaud 1 RBI, 1 from Zach Lampkin 1 RBI, 1 from Justin Brown 4 RBI’s, 1 from Zane Price, 1 from Brandon Weddington, 1 from Sam Tomes, Scottie Maupin had an RBI.

After the game, coaches Brett Petty and Travis Sheffield congratulated the players on their accomplishments of the season and for what they had accomplished in the tournament.