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Lancers Lost Title Game, But Not Their Heart

Sarasota Herald Tribune photo by ROB MATTSON

The fight the Lancers displayed throughout the game was a fitting end to the best season in program history.

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By MARTIN FENNELLY

The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 21, 2008

Updated: 05/21/2008 01:11 am

SARASOTA - The start of Tuesday's Class 1A baseball championship game was delayed two hours because of rain.

The end of it was delayed because of heart.

The scoreboard at Ed Smith Stadium said Cambridge Christian was defeated 8-6 by defending state champion and heavily favored Jacksonville Eagle's View.

We looked and looked, but couldn't find any losers.

What we found was a team with a dream, a young team with only four seniors, filled with football players, including a head football coach turned head baseball coach - and a team as tough as anything in shoulder pads.

We found a team that stared down at a 7-0 hole after three innings and fought to the last, making their final inning their most lasting - a five-run seventh to show those who will follow just how it's done when you're a Cambridge Lancer. Junior Logan McDougall carried the simple message with him.

"Heart," he said.

Their Kind Of Fight

Cambridge finished 26-3, but not before scaring a baseball factory named Eagle's View Academy, which has produced three state champs in four seasons. What was Cambridge up against? Earlier this season, Eagle's View won a game 55-0.

But that was just the kind of fight Cambridge wanted. There's nothing like trying to be the best by beating the best.

First-year Cambridge baseball head coach Rick Shears is Cambridge head football coach, too. He says one reason he took over baseball was because one of the school's priorities also happen to be his:

"When we win, we glorify God. When we lose, we glorify God. We glorify God in anything we do."

That's how they roll at Cambridge.

Oh, and they don't quit.

Seven of these baseball Lancers were football Lancers, including Taylor Cabral, a senior outfielder who was Hillsborough County's leading rusher in 2007. Fellow outfielder McDougall? He was a 170-pound nose tackle who never backed down. Cambridge went 6-4 in football. Logan McDougall had three hits Tuesday.

"We've gone from football into baseball and it's been the same - don't stop, never give up," Shears said, "I think you saw that in that five-run seventh."

Eagle's View scored three runs in each of the first two innings off Cambridge senior starting pitcher Michael Miller. But Miller didn't quit. He nearly hit a home run in the second inning, settling for a double, before hitting a two-run homer in that seventh.

"We kept fighting," Miller said.

"I would not want to go out any other way," Cabral said.

Michael Miller smiled.

"Except with a win."

Remembering Their Final Inning

Yes, they'll kick themselves over missed opportunities, the stranded runners and the mistakes on the bases or in the field, but 10 days from now - 10 years from now, and all years after - they'll remember their final inning.

Lancer upon Lancer kept pushing back Eagle's View celebration. RBI singles by freshman Andrew Widell and junior Trent Tagliarini. A sacrifice fly by senior Erik Shears, the coach's son, followed by Miller's moon shot. Lancers jumped the dugout. There was bedlam.

Yes, seniors had shown the way, but others had, too. It was a sophomore, Matt Fishman, who drove in the Lancers' first run and who relieved Miller and pitched three-plus innings of one-run ball to give Cambridge a fighting chance.

So what if they came up short? So what if they ran out of outs or Logan McDougall made the last one?

Rick Shears likes their chances next season. He has fighters coming back. By the way, the Cambridge spring football game is Saturday. If those guys are half as tough as the baseball team ... well, start with heart and go from there.

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