Staff Report

PILOT MOUNTAIN — So far this season, the Post 142 Surry Pride junior American Legion team has been somewhat of a roller coaster.

Starting its season with a 13-2 trouncing at the hands of Reagan, the Pride came right back in the second half of the double header for a 6-0 win.

Another double header split with Reynolds along with a 5-3 win over Reagan this past week and the Pride have shown they are capable of defeating division opponents and playing solid baseball.

Post 142 head coach Chad Freeman said while the season is still young, he thinks his team needs to find a rhythm and an identity. Surry is 3-4 overall with a 2-3 division mark.

“It’s kind of hard to tell,” Freeman said of where the Pride sit. “We’ve played seven games and we’ll have some where we play good defense and don’t hit the ball as well as we should and we’ve had others where we hit the ball well and don’t play defense. The key right now for us is to find some consistency offensively, defensively and from our starting pitching. We need to be able to work ahead and throw a lot of strikes, but we still have two-thirds of the season left, so there is a whole lot of baseball to go.”

Even though a scheduled home double-header with West Forsyth was canceled due to rain Sunday, the junior Pride have a hectic schedule ahead.

Surry will travel to High Point for a non-league game Tuesday, then head to West Forsyth for Sunday’s makeup double-header Wednesday, take a day off Thursday, then host Mt. Tabor in a double-header Friday and then turn around and play Mt. Tabor away in another double-header on Sunday.

“We’re pretty slammed the next two weeks,” Freeman said.

So far this season Cameron Sheets (East Surry), Chase Mills (East Surry), Zach French (Pilot Mountain) and Drew Wilson (East Surry) lead Surry offensively. All four are batting over .400 for the year, with French 7-for-16.

The Pride have relied on a trio of East Surry pitchers as starters so far, with Blake Gilley at 1-1 on the season while Eric Sonafrank and Drew Wilson are each 1-0.

Surry is chasing Wilkes County and Kernersville, the two strongest teams, according to Freeman.

The Wilkes team is comprised primarily of players off the 26-2 Wilkes Central regional semifinalist and the 1A state champion West Wilkes squad.

“We’ve got 13 or 14 games left and plenty of room for improvement,” Freeman said. “We’ve started moving in the right direction and have won two out of our last three. Both were league wins which is good for us towards getting a shot at the playoffs. We’ll keep working and hopefully string together some wins.”