By CT McDonald
After going 1-2 in the past weekend’s NC-SC Challenge American Legion Baseball tournament at Newberry, Chapin-Newberry Post 193-24 recorded a loss to Fort Mill in the first of two League V home games this week.
The Post 193-24 seniors team took a 12-9 loss to Rowan County, NC in their first Challenge tournament game on Friday, then lost 7-0 to Randolph County, NC in Saturday’s game. But then Chapin-Newberry beat Cleveland County, NC 7-3 in the tournament’s final game on Sunday to add a win to South Carolina’s 5-4 victory over the three North Carolina teams in the 13th annual NC-SC Challenge.
Sumter Post 15 was also 1-2 in the event, but Florence Post 1 went undefeated (3-0) to help South Carolina clinch the tournament victory. Sumter is ranked No. 3 and Florence is No. 4 in this week’s SC American Legion Baseball (ALB) poll at PalmettoPreps.com.
North Carolina and South Carolina are neck-and-neck in tournament wins, with NC at 7 and SC now at six. Next year’s Challenge will move back to North Carolina, according to the tournament’s alternating home site schedule.
With ALB teams resuming the regular schedule this week, Chapin-Newberry (C-N) faced the League V leader, Fort Mill, at the Newberry College Smith Road Complex and took a 6-4 loss, with Lancaster, the league’s fourth-place team, set to visit today, Thursday, with a 7:30 pm start time.
Post 193-24 will then travel to Lancaster for a 7 pm re-match on Friday to round-out this week’s competition. Then C-N starts next week against the league’s two top teams; Fort Mill (No. 1) and Rock Hill (No. 2).
C-N plays at Rock Hill at 7 pm on Monday, and then at Fort Mill on Tuesday, also at 7 pm.
