East Mississippi sweeps No. 8 Georgia Perimeter to highlight season-opening baseball action in Florida

NICEVILLE, Fla. – The East Mississippi Community College baseball team knocked off preseason eighth-ranked Georgia Perimeter College twice (7-6, 8-4) this past weekend at the Carl McInnis Classic to highlight the Lions' season-opening tournament action on the campus of Northwest Florida State College.  

Ranked 18^th nationally in Collegiate Baseball's 2015 NJCAA Division II preseason poll, the EMCC Lions also dropped a pair of decisions (7-3, 7-1) to host Northwest Florida State en route to posting a very respectable 2-2 mark over the weekend against two nationally acclaimed NJCAA Division I opponents.

Bouncing back from their 7-3 season-opening setback to the NWF State Raiders on Friday, the Lions had to rally from early 4-0 and 5-2 deficits against Georgia Perimeter.  The big blow against GPC Friday afternoon was Kyle Liberto's three-run triple in the bottom of the third to tie the score at 5-5.  An inning later, the Lions took their first lead on a sacrifice fly by David Pimentel and then added the would-be deciding run when JoVaughn McNabb scored on a wild pitch after stealing third base.

With EMCC out-hitting Georgia Perimeter, 12-9, on Friday, McNabb, Pimentel, Liberto and Blake Key all had two hits apiece to lead the way.  On the mound for the Lions in their 7-6 victory over GPC, sophomore right-hander Andrew Crane picked up the win after pitching the first five innings to raise his career record to 7-1.  Jake Bracewell threw a scoreless sixth as did Kosciusko's Ryan Rigby in the seventh to pick up the save.

The next day against Georgia Perimeter, EMCC again trailed 2-0 after the first inning, but an eight-run second frame powered the Lions to the 8-4 triumph.  Hits by Crane and Liberto to lead off the second ignited the Lions' big inning that also featured a three-run homer by Pimentel and a two-run double by former New Hope standout Taylor Stafford.

At the plate in the second straight win over GPC, Crane and fellow Pascagoula product Corley Reynolds had two hits each to pace the Lions' eight-hit team effort.  Sophomore left-hander J'Daylin Jackson, out of Greenville's St. Joseph Catholic School, improved his EMCC career pitching mark to 9-1 after throwing the first four innings.

In their weekend finale on Saturday evening, the Lions couldn't overcome a six-run second inning by NWF State in falling by a 7-1 final tally.  McNabb had two of EMCC's six hits in the loss.  Madison Central product Layton Dill took the loss in his first collegiate start.

Freshman right-hander JC Redden, who along with Stafford paced the New Hope Trojans to consecutive Class 5A state championships, was saddled with the loss in EMCC's Friday setback to NWF State.

For the weekend, East Mississippi hit .297 as a team with 30 total hits during the four games.  Pimentel, the state of Tennessee's representative in last year's prestigious Power Showcase Home Run Derby held in Miami, Fla., smashed two home runs with seven RBIs during his EMCC debut.  The Brentwood (Tenn.) High School product batted .308 and slugged at a .769 clip during the four games.

McNabb, a freshman outfielder from Hattiesburg, batted a team-leading .385 (5-for-13) with two stolen bases over the two days for the Lions, while Liberto, a sophomore shortstop out of Hancock High School, hit .300 (3-for-10) with a double to go along with his three-run triple.

Coach Chris Rose's EMCC Lions are set to make their 2015 home season debut with a Tuesday doubleheader against preseason 11^th-ranked Jones County Junior College.  First pitch is slated for 1 p.m. at Gerald Poole Field on the Scooba campus.