Whiteoak Regional Final Preview: Wildcats take on ‘friendly rival’ Eastern Meigs
Doing what they have all season long, the Whiteoak Wildcats have dug deep, played solid baseball and even had a few clutch moments to land at and earn a spot in the Division IV Regional Finals for the first time in program history.
The Division IV No. 1 state-ranked Whiteoak Wildcats (27-2) will face fellow Southeast District counterpart, the Eastern Meigs Eagles (27-2), in a game played at Beavers Field in Lancaster on Friday at 5 p.m. for a ticket to the Division IV State Final Four.
Getting to the regional finals for the two teams consisted of winning the previous day, with the Wildcats defeating the Toronto Red Knights by a 4-3 score, while Eastern defeated Centerburg, 8-3 in the semifinal round of the regionals.
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Being in the Southeast District, both the Wildcats and Eagles are familiar with each other as the Eagles were the first team of the 2018 season to defeat the Wildcats by a 5-3 score in late April, snapping a then 17-game winning streak to start the season by Whiteoak.
The first meeting between the two teams was at VA Memorial Stadium in Chillicothe. At that time, Whiteoak head coach Chris Veidt said the following about the late April loss.
“Obviously, this was not the result we were looking for, but overall a great learning experience. Eastern is a state-caliber team, and their two losses are to Toronto and last year’s district champion, Waterford,” Veidt said. “To play this type of competition in this atmosphere (VA Memorial Stadium) cannot be any more valuable to us moving forward.”
Veidt was exactly correct in his assessment of then facing Eastern, as the Wildcats went on to win a district championship over Waterford and then the aforementioned win over Toronto.
The Eagles this season not only have 27 wins, but this postseason they’ve only allowed five runs, with wins over Federal Hocking by a 11-0 score, followed with a win over the Fairfield Lions at 4-0 in the district semifinals. Next was a 13-2 win over Clay in five innings for a district championship and next was the win over Centerburg by a score of 8-3.
On Thursday, Kaleb Hill led Eastern at the plate by finishing 2-for-4, while Austin Coleman and Christian Mattox also each had two hits in the regional semifinals vs. Centerburg.
Whiteoak has defeated this postseason: Peebles by a 10-0 score, Belpre at 12-3, Waterford by a 10-0 score and the 4-3 win over Toronto. WHS has outscored their opponents this postseason, 36-8.
Even with all of their success this season, Whiteoak still thinks about that first loss of the season as Veidt told a story about using the loss to Eastern as extra motivation.
“We know each other,” Veidt said of the Eagles. “The great thing to me is it’s two teams from the Southeast District. It’s a friendly rivalry. Coach Bowen and I are good friends and have been for years. We help each other out when we can. It’s one of our blemishes – 5-3 – I said, you think of ways to motivate the kids, and our kids were devastated by that loss. They’re (Eastern) dog piling on the field, and our kids are sitting right here looking at them and watching. I said ‘guys, now you know how it feels and how quick it can all end. It’s April. It’s not June 6. Who cares? Take this moment, visualize it and keep it inside, and we’re going to play them again in the regional finals.’
“I was just looking for a way to keep them front and center, but here we are. That doesn’t mean we’re going to win, obviously – we’ve got to play our game – but man, there’s some things about it that are just surreal. It really is. We’re going to go after it (Friday) the way we’ve gone after it all year, and if we do that, I’m confident in the outcome.”