Familiar teams chase more state titles
SHEPHERDSTOWN — St. Albans, Hurricane and Wheeling Park return to Charleston again in search of baseball immortality. All three teams were there at last year’s state tournament and only Hedgesville is a new face and different from 2018 field.
The Class AA ranks will have multi-year champion Bridgeport returning again, as will Frankfort from Mineral County. The two teams winning their way to Charleston which couldn’t do so last season are Shady Spring and Scott’s Sky Hawks.
Defending champion Moorefield gets the No. 1 seed in the small school bracket, where Charleston Catholic and Wheeling Central Catholic also come back again. The only new entry that wasn’t around in 2018 is St. Joseph High School in Huntington, which replaces 2018 entry Ravenswood.
St. Albans and Hurricane have become common sights in Charleston at this time of year. And Wheeling Park, which hasn’t won a big school title in years, is back for the fifth consecutive season.
Bridgeport has dominated the Class AA ranks and has won five straight championships. The Indians will open against Shady Spring, a team with a 19-9 overall record. Frankfort eliminated Fairmont Senior the same as the Yellowjackets had done in 2018 en route to a state championship.
Moorefield opens against Huntington St. Joseph’s while No. 2 seed Charleston Catholic faces No. 3 Wheeling Central Catholic.
The first round of the Class AAA bracket is scheduled for this evening with the championship game coming on Saturday.
Both the Class AA and the Class A championship games are also carded for Saturday in Charleston.
Hedgesville claimed its only baseball state championship in 2013 and is back again after defeating Jefferson, 3-1 and 11-0 in a best 2-of-3 series in the Region II tournament early last week. The Eagles, with a 24-8 record, have one lost fewer than Wheeling Park, (20-9), while Hurricane surges in with a 32-3 mark and St. Albans travels the few short miles to the state capital with a 32-4 record.