Generals rout Covington
Waynesboro used a homer, three hits and five RBI from Travis Echols and eight strong innings on the mound from Tavis Bruce to ride to an easy 11-2 win over Covington in the regular-season finale for both teams Friday night.
The Generals (26-18), the #3 seed in the 2011 Valley League playoffs, will host #6 seed Rockbridge (21-23) Saturday at 7 p.m. at Mathers Park in Waynesboro in Game 1 of a best-of-three first-round series.
Waynesboro will go into the postseason as maybe the hottest team in the league, winning seven of its last eight to seize control of what had been a tight Southern Division race. The key down the stretch: pitching, as was the case against Friday in Covington. Bruce (1-1) gave up one run on five hits in eight innings of work.
Bruce got all the support that he’d need in a three-run second. Devin Smith singled to center, scoring Scott Wilcox from second to get Waynesboro on the board at 1-0. An Echols RBI single that followed an error that allowed Smith to score extended the lead to 3-0.
It was 4-0 in the fifth when Echols came up with two outs and the bases loaded. Echols took the pitch from Sean Hagen to left-center and out of the ballpark for a grand slam that broke the game open.
Smith, Wilcox and Jimmy Holton each had two hits for Waynesboro.
