Gaston College records 11th DH sweep of season

After digging down deep to take a pair of come-from-behind wins in Saturday's doubleheader sweep victory over Louisburg College, Gaston College relied on stout pitching and defense and timely hitting in Sunday's doubleheader sweep of the Hurricanes at Gastonia's Sims Legion Park.

Starting pitchers Kyle McKernan and Derek Vartanian nearly threw back-to-back shutouts as the Rhinos won 4-1 over Louisburg in the opener with McKernan throwing 6 2/3 shutout innings and Vartanian followed that up with a 5-hitter in a 4-0 victory.

The sweep was Gaston College's 11th of 14 doubleheaders this season and improved the nationally-ranked Rhinos to 39-5 overall and 15-3 in Region 10.

"Obviously we played a lot better today," said Rhinos head coach Shohn Doty, whose team is ranked No. 15 in the National Junior College Athletic Association poll, No. 9 in thejbb.net poll and No. 11 in the Dream Big Athletics poll. "We didn't score as many runs today, but got good starting pitching and our offense was on the barrel all day. We just hit a lot of balls hard and right at them.
"In three of the four games we got really starting pitching. J.D. (Everett) was real good yesterday (in the opener) and Kyle was really good today and Vartanian was even better.
"This series gave us a good gauge on finding ways to win and finding out what's working on that day and how to find a way to do it."

McKernan yielded four hits and didn't allow a run until a two-out RBI single in the seventh. He finished with seven strikeouts.

The Rhinos gave McKernan the support he needed with one run in the second inning, two in the third and one in the fourth.

Preston Hall's RBI double knocked in the first run, Adam Quintero's 2-run double accounted for the third inning runs and Enrique Wood led off the fourth with a home run.

In the nightcap, Vartanian allowed only one runner to reach second - in the second inning - and had seven strikeouts in recording Gaston College's 10th shutout of the season.

He was supported by one run in the first, two in the second and one in the sixth.

Konni Durschlag singled to open the first before being erased on Wade Kelly's fielder's choice grounder. Kelly then stole second, advanced to third on a wild pitch and scored on Adam Quintero's RBI grounder.

A fielding error on Miller St. John's grounder allowed Hall and Wood to score in the second. And Seth Christmas' RBI single provided the final run.

"I was impressed with how we came out and handled our business today," Doty said. "And that starts with the older guys that understand how important this is. If you had told me at the start of the season we'd be 39-5, I'd say I'd take it every day.
"So I'm proud of our kids and we've got a really big one coming up."

Gaston College visits Florence-Darlington Tech (40-7, 17-2) for 1 p.m. doubleheaders on Saturday and Sunday that'll determine the Region 10 regular season champion that also gets an automatic bid to the NJCAA district tournament in mid-May. The host Stingers are ranked No. 5 in the NJCAA poll.