Texas advances into championship game

West Virginia beats South Carolina to force today's semifinal.

By ALEX LYNCH

© St. Petersburg Times, published August 14, 2000

GULFPORT -- Texas defeated Georgia 6-4 Sunday to earn a spot in the championship game of the Little League Southern Regional.

In the other game, West Virginia stopped South Carolina 5-0, forcing a final at 10 a.m. today in the losers' bracket. The winner plays Texas on Tuesday. Sunday's game was reminiscent of the first-round game between Georgia and Texas: Georgia took an early 4-0 lead but Texas rallied to win.

"These kids don't even know what is going on," Texas manager Terry McConn said. "This was just another game to them."

Texas rallied after making a pitching change, shutting out Georgia over the last three innings.

Michael Johnson, who struck out five in five innings, handled Georgia's hitters the rest of the way, namely Jonathon Hutto. Hutto tied a Southern Regional record with two home runs Friday against Alabama.

Hutto was 0-for-4, striking out three times against Texas.

Texas, trailing 4-2, got its offense in gear in the fourth inning. Alex Atherton's two-run double with the bases load tied the score at 4, and Terrence McConn's two-run single later in the inning gave Texas the lead.

"Our guys, through all the tournaments, have been down a lot but have always come back and started hitting the ball and (doing) whatever it takes to win a game," McConn said. "This game was no different." West Virginia, which was knocked into the losers' bracket by the Florida team, had a much bigger task at hand: beat a South Carolina team that was in last year's Southern Regional.

But West Virginia, also in last year's tournament, rode the pitching of) Aaron Radcliff.

Radcliff not only shut down South Carolina, striking out 11, he hit a fifth-inning grand slam that wrapped around the rightfield foul pole.

"That was great," West Virginia manager Ron Keaton said. "It was just a matter of time. We were waiting on something to happen."

"I was late on it and I thought it was going to go foul," Radcliff said.

South Carolina manager Phil Campbell, who questioned whether the home run was fair, said the hit never should have occurred. Campbell said the previous pitch, called a ball, was a strike.

"This game was heavily influenced by the umpires," Campbell said. "We didn't get the call that would have struck him out."

TITLE GAME ON TV: ESPN2 will televise Tuesday's championship game at 8 p.m. The broadcasters will be Jack Edwards and Harold Reynolds.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.

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