Pictured: Kevin Schoneboom on the mound for the Eagles.
By: Justin Hargrove, Assistant Athletic Director
Northeast Texas Community College Baseball hosted Paris Junior College for the first home conference games of the 2023 season and each team came away with a win in the series. NTCC won game one 7-2 before falling to Paris in game two 8-3.
Game one’s victory was led by a great pitching performance by Kevin Schoneboom (Mansfield, Texas) who pitched a complete game giving up just two runs on five hits in seven innings on the mound. Schoneboom would strike out three PJC Dragons, and induced Paris into seven ground outs and 10 pop flies to keep the PJC offense grounded.
NTCC got hot early on offense, scoring in each of the first four innings of play. The Eagles got on the board in the first inning when Carson Lorch (Cypress, Texas) reached via fielder’s choice and scored on back to back errors by PJC to go up 1-0. Inning number two saw the Eagles again score by taking advantage of two hit by the pitches and one walk with Bennie Qualls (Humble, Texas) laying down a sacrifice bunt to score Austin Rogers (Prosper, Texas) who was the lead off man hit by the pitch.
The Dragons would answer in the top of the third when they tied the game at 2-2 but that was short lived as NTCC added two more runs in the bottom of the third to regain the lead 4-2.
Seth Cox (Fairview, Texas) would single with one out and Rohan Sanganeria (Santa Clara, CA) followed Cox with a single of his own. Nathan Harmon (Highland Village, Texas) would double to score both Cox and Sanganeria.
The Eagles would add three runs in the bottom of the fourth to increase the lead to 7-2, which would prove to be enough to take down the Dragons in the seven-inning game. Qualls, Anthony Capobianco (San Antonio, Texas) and Lorch would all score in the inning for NTCC.
Game two would not be as kind to the Eagles as the Dragon offense came alive early and often as they say in the nine-inning game. Paris would score one run in the first and one in the second to go up 2-0 before NTCC answered back in the bottom of the third to tie the game at 2-2.
Bryce Johnson (Fairview, Texas) would start the Eagle half of the third with a single and would advance to second on a sac bunt by Bennie Qualls. Raef Wright (Burleson, Texas) would single to center to score Johnson. Wright used his speed to steal second base and get in scoring position for Cox to drive him in with a double to right-center field.
The Eagles would take a brief 3-2 lead when they added their final run in the bottom of the fourth when Caleb Reynolds (Frisco, Texas) reached via a single and made his way around the bases off another base hit by Johnson, stealing third base and scoring on a Sacrifice Fly by Qualls.
Paris tied the game at 3-3 in the top of the fifth inning and then added two runs in the eighth and three final runs in the top of the ninth to cap off the win 8-3.
Austin Burda (Mansfield, Texas) would get the nod in game two and go five innings for NTCC giving up three runs on five hits with two walks and five strikeouts. Also seeing time for the Eagles were, George Austin (Dallas, Texas), Nolan Bushko (Haslet, Texas), Garrett Sargent (Lake Jackson, Texas), and Matthew Howell (Huntsville, Texas).
