GOFF SAVES BEARCATS WIN OVER WEST FORK

No Booneville Bearcat pitcher had registered a save during the 2023 season until Dax Goff nailed down a 12-9 win over West Fork in the opening round of the Class 3A Region 1 tournament shortly before 9 p.m. Thursday night in Harrison.

Goff recorded his second career save with three straight strikeouts, recording the first 1-2-3 inning of the night for the Bearcats (16-7), who, with the win, earned a state tournament berth for the third straight year.

Throwing just 14 pitches, 10 for strikes, Goff, the fourth Bearcat pitcher of the night, saved it for Brooks Herrera (6-4), who threw 110 pitches in just four plus innings but picked up his 15th career win.

Herrera allowed just four hits, but was victimized by nine walks and three hit batters. Combined the Bearcats walked 12 and hit six batters. Goff's three strikeouts to end it completed an 11-strikeout game by the Bearcat staff.

Herrera, a senior, also had a big hand in making sure his final season as a Bearcat did not end. He was 2-for-3 at the plate, leading off the game with a double and scoring a run and later circling the bases for an inside the park, three-run home run (shown sliding in at home) in the sixth to open what seemed to be a safe 12-4 lead.

The home run was Herrera’s third of the season and it was his fourth run scored of the night.

Herrera scored his first of those four runs on a single by Rhett Nietert, who had started a 3-for-5 night in which he would drive in three in the first.

Still the Bearcats would settle for just one run in the inning even after Goff was hit by a pitch and Dunn Daniel singled.

West Fork broke on top in the bottom of the second without a hit. The inning started with a walk but after a fielder’s choice and a strikeout – one of Herrera’s six – there would be a two walks and two hit batters and it was 2-1 before a strikeout ended the frame.

Nietert led off the third with his second hit and scored on a double by Peyton Tatum, who scored on a single by Daniel (3-for-4) to give the Bearcats the lead again, 3-2.

Ry Ray lifted a sacrifice fly for another run that became two because of a throwing error and it was 5-2.

A two-out, two-run double, with two down in the bottom of the inning got West Fork within 5-4 through three innings.

Besides his three hits, Nietert reached on a fourth inning Tiger error and Goff followed with a single that scored Herrera, who had walked, and it was 6-4.

West Fork started their fourth with a double and a walk, but Herrera worked out of it. A sacrifice moved potential tying runners into scoring position but a strikeout and a pop fly ended the threat.

In the fifth Matt O’Barr and Herrera sandwiched walks around David Hicks being hit by a pitch and Nietert delivered a two run single. A Tiger error allowed Goff to reach and a run to score to make it 9-4.

Herrera allowed a double and a walk before hitting his pitch limit in the bottom of the fifth but Jace Washburn put out the fire by inducing an infield fly, recording a strikeout and, after a walk, getting a fly ball out.

Washburn also singled in the Bearcat sixth and was chased, along with pinch runner Cameron Osborne, home on Herrera’s inside the park home run to make it 12-4.

That lead was trimmed to 12-9 in the Tiger sixth, thanks partly to a pair of errors, after the Tigers had used a walk, a single, and a hit batter to load the bases.

Another hit batter scored one and the two errors scored runs, although Goff threw out one runner trying to stretch one base into two. The ninth run came home on a passed ball.

Tatum induced a line out to Washburn at short – the sophomore played four positions in the game – to finally end the frame.

Daniel walked in the top of the seventh but was stranded and head coach Arron Kimes turned to Goff to finish it.

The Bearcats will meet Charleston at 2:30 Friday. Charleston was the Conference 3A-4 regular season runner-up but won the district tournament.