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By Alexis Brudnicki

As games finish throughout the day, check this post for final scores, wrap-ups and postgame quotes.

Russell County High (Seale, Ala.) 5, Parkview High (Lilburn, Ga.) 7

Russell county struggled in the field, wasting a solid pitching performance from righthander Todd Dial, as the Parkview Panthers took down the Warriors 7-5 in the first game of Friday's National High School Invitational action.

Dial went all six innings for Russell County, giving up just one earned run of the seven that the Warriors surrendered, on nine hits, walking two batters and striking out six. The defense behind the righthander committed a total of five errors in the game.

"Horrible defense," Russell County head coach Tony Rasmus said. "That's the story of our year. We've been absolutely brutal in the field. I tell you what, if I could trade our guys for two or three more fielders, it'd be a good time to do it.

"I'm so sick of seeing errors. Just on routine plays, we just make error after error. All of (the runs) were unearned weren't they? Todd threw an outstanding game and to get a loss, it's just terrible. It's terrible; hard to watch."

Coming into Friday's game, Dial had been undefeated through his four trips to the mound. Rasmus has been impressed with his righty on the hill, though he doesn't garner much attention.

"He's been up to 91 (mph) earlier in the year," the Warriors coach said. "He's a little-bitty guy, so he doesn't get a lot of love from scouts and whathaveyou, but he's a good pitcher. He throws a changeup, and a curveball.

"They struggled with him. They started looking off-speed when he was throwing the fastball by them because he doesn't throw 70. He throws 85-88. It was just a good outing. I think he was 4-0 before this, so this is his first loss of the year."

Jesse Foster got the start for Parkview and came out on top despite giving up 12 hits to the Warriors. The righthander threw six innings, allowing three earned runs and striking out two. Jack Esmonde came on in relief for the final inning and gave up two runs (one earned) on one hit.

Highlands Ranch (Colo.) High 3, George Washington High (New York) 2

George Washington had their best outing of the tournament so far, with 11 strikeouts from Edwin Corniel in a complete-game effort, but ended up on the losing end of a 3-2 affair with Highlands Ranch.

The Trojans have yet to win a game at the NHSI, but head coach Steve Mandl believes that the team he's seeing on the field isn't the same one that he's seen earlier this year.

"We're not really showing our true selves out here," Mandl said. "I'm not sure what's going on. We came out a little bit better today and I thought we were going to play the way we normally do and then we were ahead, and we threw the ball away, which is what we've been doing every game. So it's too late to do something here but hopefully we can fix it by the time we get home."

The Trojans recorded just five hits off of Highlands Ranch righthander Tony Audino in his complete-game effort. Audino gave up two runs (one earned), walked three and struck out six.

Though Corniel baffled the Falcons batters, he gave up three runs (two earned) on a total of nine hits. He also walked three batters in the effort. The defense behind him behind him committed one error.

"We're not doing anything right," Mandl said. "The defense is really bad, the mental part of the game is really bad, we're not hitting with any thought. We're striking out too much, pitchers are throwing too many pitches, they're walking too many.

"Usually we're a kind of team that if one facet's not going right, we can make up for it. But when all four, five or six things are going wrong, it's hard to win games that way and that's what we have to try to fix. And we're sitting down every night, all the coaches, trying to figure out what's going on. People keep asking me, 'Are the kids nervous?' Not at all. Most of them have been on big stages before. We've played in championship games in Yankee and Shea Stadium so they've gone to all these national showcases. It's not nervousness, we just can't figure out what's going on."

Orange (Calif.) Lutheran High 7, Brookwood High (Snellville, Ga.) 4

Sophomore righthander Garett King threw a 64-pitch, seven-inning complete game to lead Orange Lutheran to a 7-4 win over Brookwood on Friday.

King allowed four runs (one earned) on seven hits, striking out two in the effort. The fielders behind him committed three errors, but the 15-year-old kept the Lancers in the game.

"(That's) just what we've seen all year from him," Orange Lutheran head coach Eric Borba said. "For a 15-year-old kid, just a sophomore, it's just so fun to watch him pitch because he commands three pitches, four pitches actually. And he can throw any pitch at any time.

"He just did a great job. He went seven innings right there with three errors behind him in 64 pitches. And that's just a little bit about what he does and what we teach our pitchers, to throw strikes and use your defense. Unfortunately we didn't play very good defense, but he did exactly what we asked."

The game was tied at four runs apiece heading into the final frame. The Lancers hitters put pressure on the Broncos defense and capitalized on some Brookwood mistakes to plate three in the top of the inning.

"We did some good things offensively," Borba said. "We put pressure on them and that's our philosophy. High school kids are going to make mistakes. We had runners on base and put pressure on their defense and made them make plays. And fortunately for us, that pressure paid off because they didn't make all the plays."

Allen Tokarz started on the hill for Brookwood. The righthander finished 4 2/3 innings, giving up five hits, four earned runs, four walks and striking out one batter.

Sarasota (Fla.) High 1, Mater Dei High (Santa Ana, Calif.) 5

Mater Dei continued to tear through its opponents in the NSHI, taking down Sarasota 5-1 to secure its spot in the championship game on Saturday.

Ty Moore scored the go-ahead run with an RBI-single in the fifth inning. The outfielder went 1-for-2 with a walk, a run scored and two runs driven in on the day.

"He's impressive," Monarchs head coach Burt Call said. "He's one of the best baseball players to come through Mater Dei. He'll continue to work hard and continue to compete."

Mater Dei used three pitchers to get through the Sailors lineup. Charlie Vorscheck got the start and went 5 1/3 innings, giving up one run on six hits, walking two and striking out six. Brian Conley came on in relief for 2/3 of an inning, allowing a hit and two walks, also notching a strikeout.

When Conley got into a jam in the final frame, Call went to his bullpen to bring in Chase Radan with the bases juiced. Radan closed out the last inning and struck out one batter.

"That was a heart-stopper," Call said. "Chase Radan came in and did a great job, especially with bases loaded and nobody out, coming up with some clutch outs for us. So that was huge for us."

Sarasota proved to be a tougher opponent than many thought as they came into the tournament after losing two of their top players. After winning their first game against Lee County by double digits and upsetting Orange Lutheran in their second game on Thursday, the Sailors kept Mater Dei's offense to the fewest number of runs they've put up so far.

"They did," Call said of Sarasota giving them a tough time. "I thought their pitcher worked in and out effectively, got ahead in counts and then kept us off-balance. Then they made plays, we hit some balls hard right at them and they were able to make some plays. They're a good defensive club and they did a great job."

Righthander Trevor Wilson pitched Sarasota's third complete game in a row, throwing six innings, giving up five runs (four earned) on seven hits, walking three and fanning one batter.

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