While the 1-4 start isn’t what fans of Statesboro baseball were looking for in 2017, they were in for an encouraging surprise Monday night.
    Hosting Benedictine, the 2014 Class AA state champions, Statesboro rolled up and tossed the Cadets aside like dirty laundry in a 12-0 mercy ruling at Mill Creek Park. Considering Statesboro’s only win had come against SEB in a walk-off, Monday’s game was a refreshing change of pace.
    But the highlight of the night wasn’t the 12 runs scored by Statesboro or the seven-run fourth inning, it was the Devils' ace, Griffin Davis swatting down Cadet batters like flies.
    Davis pitched five innings of no-hit baseball, fanning seven of the 17 Benedictine batters he faced. Even if only 35 of his 60 pitches went for strikes and he would wind up walking three batters, the performance was purely typical for the Blue Devil ace.
    “He will be our Monday starter all year,” Simmons. “He’s got the stuff to take us far.”
    As for Benedictine’s arms, there was a lot left to be desired — especially when it came to control. Between the four hurlers the Cadets put on the mound, they would combine to walk 13 Blue Devils to giving up only nine hits.
    They were certainly a far cry from Camden County’s Ian Smith and Aaron Wainwright who combined to strikeout Statesboro 15 times over the past weekend. Those free passes led to many of Statesboro’s runs, which would culminate in their first run-rule win of the season.
    After leaving runners stranded on 2nd and 3rd in the first inning, Statesboro would start taking advantage of the free passes in the following inning. With a man on second and one out, Blake Stanford drew a 3-2 walk to put two on for Davis Wiggins — who an out later would see his at-bat produce a wild 2-1 pitch to advance both runners to scoring position.
    “Davis see’s a lot of pitches and he’s not afraid to go deep in the count,” Simmons said. “He’ll be our best guy in the leadoff spot this year.”
    On a 3-1 pitch, Benedictine Pitcher threw another wild pitch that would bring around Irizarry to score and put Wiggins on first to leave runners at the corners. The next at-bat would walk Ty Tiddick to load the bases, then Austin Daniels would capitalize with a single to left field to drive in Stanford.
    Dalton Ross came up next to only see four straight pitches inaccurately fly by to walk in the fourth run of the inning. Had Cam Harvey’s bat not have been sticking straight up when he ducked down to avoid a high pitch and made contact with the ball for an inadvertent bunt, Statesboro may have tacked on more than four runs.
    Alas, Statesboro only needed three hits to drive in those four runs because of the four bases on balls. And the trend would continue throughout the game, because the following inning Statesboro scored two more runs off three walks and one Wiggins single.
    “This was Jekyll and Hyde from Saturday,” Simmons said. “This pitching was probably a little better, but execution tonight was a good as it’s been all season.”  
    However it was the fourth inning that really broke Benedictine’s back. Between the two Cadet pitchers, they’d give up seven runs on four walks and three hits by Statesboro — with Ross and Harvey each getting two plate appearances as Statesboro would go around their entire lineup before Davis would set down the order in the top of the fifth to end the game.
    “I still think they’re a quality team, but we just jumped on them early,” Simmons said. “We come in 1-4 and the eight hits we got tonight isn’t far off from what we’ve been in our other five games. Our quality at-bat percentage was high tonight.”
    Tiddick and Ross each went 2-4, with Ross and Wiggins each driving in three runs. All nine Blue Devil hitters reached base at least once, with seven of the nine each getting at least one hit and eight of the nine scoring at least one run.
    Statesboro (2-4) will continue their series with Benedictine Wednesday at Mill Creek Park before finishing up the three-game run in Savannah on Saturday.