Red Devils dominate Dragons

Dylan Heiring is essentially auditioning for a scholarship each time he toes the rubber, waiting for some college, any college, to make an official offer.

"It's always in your head," Heiring said, "and you never stop thinking about it."

These first two starts should help.

The left-hander struck out nine in five solid innings, Josh Gordon hit a two-run homer, and Avon Park took advantage of five Lake Placid errors en route to an 11-1 victory in the Bill Jarrett Early Bird Classic finale on Friday night at Charles R. Head Field.

"Today I was impressed with our team," Heiring said. "We've taken some incredible strides since the fall, and yeah, I was happy with what I did, but it could have been better."

Avon Park's first eight defensive outs came via strikeout, and although Heiring walked four, he was virtually flawless. His lone mistake - an RBI single by Dylan Weber-Callahan in the second inning - was rendered a mere footnote by game's end. It was also Lake Placid's only hit of the game.

"He gives us a chance every time he goes out there," Avon Park coach Whit Cornell said. "He's a senior and he's ready to be one of the leaders on this team. He had a good, solid outing."

And it was a dazzling encore to Heiring's season-opening start against Pasco, in which he struck out 10 in five innings and got the win. A promising start to the season, indeed.

"It's pretty stressful," Heiring said of pitching while also trying to weigh offers from colleges. "You try to worry about it on the weekends, when no one else is around. I just try to go with the flow when I'm out on the mound."

Avon Park (2-1) made Heiring's job easier after posting two runs in the second inning, after an RBI fielder's choice and a run-scoring infield single. But Weber-Callahan followed with an RBI single of his own in the third, scoring Mario Gonzales and trimming Lake Placid's deficit to 2-1.

With one out in the bottom half of the third, Gordon crushed a two-run homer off Weber-Callahan that barely cleared the wall in left-center, giving the Red Devils a 4-1 lead.

They exploded for six runs in the fourth, doing all of their damage with two outs. The biggest blow came from Drew Reeves, whose bases-clearing double came after two Lake Placid errors. The six-run inning pushed the Red Devils' lead to 10-1.

Lake Placid coach Dan Coomes said he wasn't necessarily surprised by the result after starting six first-time players.

"When you have that, you're going to have games where you play great and games when you play horrible," he said. "I know what to expect when that happens."

Weber-Callahan, making his first start of the season, allowed eight hits and 10 runs (although not all were earned) in four innings, while playing in front of a defense that made four errors (five total). He gave way to Brodie Carr, who was cruising along before Reeves ended the game with a bouncing chopper to short. The ball was bobbled, allowing the run to score and initiate the mercy rule.

"Those things happen when you've got new guys out there," Coomes said. "It's new to them."

Right-hander Jeff Falis, who has made a remarkable recovery after breaking his leg playing wiffle ball in the fall, pitched a scoreless sixth inning for the Red Devils.

"We stuck to our game plan and hit hard groundballs and made them make plays against us," Cornell said.