It’s been a season of learning for the Pinckney baseball team.
“We’re turning the corner, hopefully,” Pirates coach Matt Evans said Monday. “We lost a lot of tight games early, and there were a few situations where we psyched ourselves out. With a young team, you expect that, but we’re hoping everything is coming into form as the tournament comes around.”
Evans and his team will find out today, when the Pirates (7-20-1) take on Dexter (24-7) in a pre-district game at Howell High School.
The game will be broadcast on The Livingston Post starting at 5:20 p.m.
“We saw them early in the year,” Evans said. “We lost twice, but they were both good baseball games. Dexter is one of those teams that’s always a competitive game for us and we’re looking forward to seeing them.”
It will be the first game of a district gauntlet for the Pirates. A win today would put them into a district semifinal against Brighton on Saturday, with either Howell or Ann Arbor Skyline lurking in the final.
Pinckney played all four teams during the regular season, going 0-7.
“We like to see teams in our district during the regular season,” Evans said. “We scheduled all Class A schools, and we hope that helps at tournament time.”
And there’s this: In a one-game tournament, the Pirates have a puncher’s chance of moving on and ending the season on a high note.
“We told the kids at practice today that the records get thrown out of the window this time of year,” Evans said. “What they have to avoid is being their own worst enemy. Play a clean game. Everyone has a job to do. If they do that and play with everything they have, we’ll live with the result.”
