Little League Baseball: Beckley advances with a win over NRG

Survive and advance.

For the second straight day and the second game in a row, the Beckley Little League Baseball All-Stars faced an elimination game.

Once again, the Beckley boys came up big.

Building a 4-0 lead, Beckley held off a solid effort from the New River Gorge All-Stars to take a 7-4 win Monday night at Beckley Little League Park.

Beckley will now play Sophia Tuesday night in another elimination game. The location is still to be determined.

The host team took a 1-0 lead in the first inning when Reece Bennett singled and eventually stole home.

Back-to-back bases loaded walks to Kyrie Dillard and Bentley Haskins pushed the lead to 3-0 an inning later.

Haskins then singled home Daniel Gardner for a 4-0 lead in the top of the fourth inning before New River Gorge found some life in the bottom of the frame.

Kam Legg ripped a sharp double down the left field line for NRG, scoring Ryker Gravely with the first run before Legg scored on a single from Ryder Stephens.

A Beckley error on a ground ball sent a third run home, but that was as close as NRG would get Monday.

Desperate for some breathing room heading to the final inning, Gardner led off with a double to left field.

After moving up on a wild pitch, Gardner scored on a single from Kash Cantley for a 5-3 lead.

Cam Layne, who had walked earlier in the inning, scored on a wild pitch ahead of Gage Reynolds' single scoring Cantley for a 7-3 advantage.

NRG added one more run on a single from Trip Kiliany, but Jace Weiss came on for two big strikeouts to preserve the win.