Led by an outstanding performance on the mound by Justin Winborne, the Block Bears rolled to a 7-0 win over the Montgomery Tigers Thursday afternoon in a District 3-1A game.

Winborne went the distance and allowed just six batters to reach base. He ended up striking out 15 batters while giving up just two hits and walking three. The defense did its job as well with just one error.

“Just a nice game. We almost played perfectly,” Block head coach Scott Green said. “We made several nice plays in the field. Justin was all over the plate.”

Block (8-11, 2-1) got on the board with one run in the bottom of the second inning and added two more runs in the bottom of the third. Then Winborne helped his own cause by blasting a two-run home run in the bottom of the fourth as the Bears took a 5-0 lead.

Christopher McCarthy went 3-for-3 with a walk and scored two runs, Casey Ryan had a double and John Davis was 1-for-3 with two RBIs as Block finished with nine hits.

Montgomery, on the other hand, couldn’t do much of anything against Winborne and fell to 4-3 in district play.

North Pike 6, Franklin County 3

BUDE — On Tuesday night, Franklin County’s 13-game winning streak came to an end as the Bulldogs fell to the Jaguars 10-3 at North Pike.

With the runner-up position in Region 7-3A hanging in the balance Thursday afternoon, Franklin County needed to defeat North Pike by at least eight runs to clinch a playoff spot.

Unfortunately, that didn’t happen as the Bulldogs suffered a tough loss at home to the Jaguars, who are now in second place and in control of their own destiny.

“Tough to swallow on such a good year,” Franklin County head coach Jeremy Loy said.

What was also tough to swallow was that the Bulldogs let a 3-2 lead disappear thanks to four runs scored by North Pike.

North Pike improved to 10-8 overall and 8-2 in Region 7-3A with two games against Wilkinson County set for next week. All the Jaguars need to do is win one and they’re in the playoffs.

And just like Tuesday night, North Pike’s Casey Paulk had another strong outing as he limited Franklin County (16-8, 8-4) to three runs on six hits. The Jaguars finished with 11 hits, including doubles by Paulk, Josh Huhn and Keiron Robinson.

Monterey 19, Epps 2

EPPS, La. — Billy Metcalf allowed just two runs on four hits and Monterey took advantage of eight Epps errors as the Wolves routed the Panthers on the road Thursday afternoon in a District 3-B game.

The game went just three innings as Monterey (3-1 in District 3-B) put the game away with 10 runs in the top of the third inning. The Wolves scored one run in the top of the first, yet went into the second inning with a 1-1 tie with the Panthers.

It didn’t take long for the Wolves to put some distance between themselves and the Panthers as they scored eight runs in the top of the second inning.

Because of all miscues by Epps (0-4 in District 3-B), Monterey ended up with just nine hits. Metcalf went 2-for-3 with a double while Landon White was 2-for-4 and Trey King was 2-for-2. Only one of Epps’s four hits went for extra bases – a double by J. Cobb.