By CURTIS ROCKWELL/Sports Director

RICHLAND — Richland scored the first five runs and the last two runs in the third and deciding game of the Class 4A South State opening round playoff series against visiting Pass Christian Monday night.

However, it was the 10 unanswered runs in between by the Pirates that proved to be the Rangers’ undoing.

Pass Christian, the fourth seed out of Region 8-4A, upset Region 6-4A top seed Richland 10-7 to capture the series. The Pirates were down 1-0 in the best-of-three series after a 3-0 loss in game one on the road, before slipping past the Rangers 1-0 at home on Saturday night to set up the decisive rubber match. They then trailed 5-0 after four frames Monday night before pulling out the win.

“This team is resilient and I loved our fight tonight,” PCHS head coach Ricky Smith said afterward. “We are thankful to be moving on. Congratulations to Richland on a great season.

The Pirates, who began the season with 10 straight losses, now stand 9-17 overall as they move on to face perennial state power Purvis this weekend. Richland ends its season at 18-6 after the two straight losses to the Pass.

 “The resiliency of these kids have been fun to watch after we started 0-10 and thought the sky falling,” Smith added. “But we weathered the storm and here we are coming back tonight to win and now we’re excited about this weekend.”

The Rangers jumped out to the 5-0 lead after four frames with a pair of runs in the third and a trio more in the fouth, all coming off of Pirate starting pitcher Wes Jolley.

Pass Christian began to make its move in the top of the fifth, when Skylar Summerville drew a bases-loaded walk and Aiden Mitchell scored on a fielding error to cut the deficit to 5-2.

The Pirates continued their rally with four more runs in the top of the sixth to take a lead they would never relinquish at 6-5. Summerville cracked an RBI-single while Evan Anderson posted a run-scoring double and two more runs scored on a ground ball of the bat of Brendan Necaise that the Rangers kicked around for an error.

Pass, armed with that slight 6-5 advantage, then added four more runs in the top of the seventh to seal the win. Jolley helped himself with a two-runs single, while Stephen Tinsley added an RBI triple and a run scored on a bases loaded balk by Richland as well..

Richland got a two-run single by Jasper Moorhead in its last at-bat, but the die had been cast by that point.

“Their pitcher did a great job early on short rest, but our bats woke up and got some timing down and started barreling some balls up,” Smith concluded. “It was really good to see our kids do that because for the most part, we struggled in the series offensively.”

Jolley earned the win on the mound for PCHS, and he got some help from Anderson who came on to record the final three outs after the Rangers scored their final two runs.

Anderson, Jolley, and Kayleb Munsch all had two hits each to lead Pass Christian offensively.

Pass Christian will head to Purvis Friday night to open that series before hosting the Tornadoes on Saturday.