The Maplesville Red Devils’ bats came ready to play once again and picked up an 11-9 victory on the road against Montgomery Catholic Preparatory School on Feb. 27.

Maplesville scored three runs in the fifth inning to break an eight-all tie. A fielder’s choice by Christin Brown brought home two runs and gave the Red Devils the lead for good.

“Great effort by our guys,” Maplesville head coach Clay Entrekin said. “I can’t be happier as a coach. They showed grit and determination.”

It was a back-and-forth game with both teams trading runs throughout the early going.

Every time the Red Devils had a big inning, Montgomery Catholic was quick to follow it up with an answer in the bottom half of those innings.

“We kind of shot ourselves in the foot by getting ahead and not executing to our ability,” Entrekin said. “We will continue to work on becoming that consistent team we need to be in order to be successful.”

Big innings for Maplesville included three runs in the first and four runs in the third.

Steven Gray, Brady Harrison, Osvaldo Tapia and Brent Schoener each drove in runs during the four-run third inning.

Brown not only helped the team at the plate but also on the mound. He pitched four-plus innings of relief and stymied the opposing batters in the later innings.

The success of the Maplesville batting order chased the Montgomery Catholic starting pitcher from the game in the first inning.

The Red Devils outhit Montgomery Catholic 10-8 and also played a clean game with only one error on defense compared to five by their opponent.

“Overall we are another step better than what we were, so we have something that we can hang our hat on and get better at,” Entrekin said.

The Red Devils will make the trip once again to Montgomery for a pair of games against Carver-Montgomery at Riverwalk Stadium and Alabama Christian Academy at Patterson Field. Both venues have ties both present and future to Minor League Baseball.