by Lisa Hinton-Valdrighi
At the start of each sports season, the Rappahannock Record publishes meet-the-team stories. Although the COVID-19 pandemic has canceled the 2020 seasons for high school spring sports, the paper would like to recognize those athletes who had already put in several weeks of practice and preparation and were ready to compete.
Baseball
Lancaster was the Class 1 state runner-up last season. The Red Devils lost several key players from that team, including pitcher/second baseman Spencer Crittenden, outfielder Tahlik Redmond and Matthew Kleinfelter, who now pitches for Division 1 James Madison University.
So the thought early in the preseason by coaches Welby Saunders and Scotty George was “our goal is to just get better every day and every game and finish in the top half of the district,” said Saunders. But after preseason scrimmage wins over Bruton and New Kent and seeing the players’ work ethics, the two upped the expectations.
“The way they were practicing and willing to work hard, we were getting excited that maybe we could make another run [in the postseason],” said Saunders.
Key to that was the maturity of returning…
