Although there certainly were no guarantees, the likelihood of the Logan County Cougars’ winning the regional baseball championship this season was much greater than when the relatively new school captured its first title in 1989.
After all, the current team features its most experienced player ever in talented catcher Dustin Cartas (a six-year all-district performer who was batting cleanup as a seventh grader), seven members of the 2009 Little League World Series team (starters Caleb Bruner, Matt Harper, Ian Woodall and Joe Holliday along with reserves Jacob Wood, Daniel Beaty and Tucker Baldwin) and five members of the 15-year-old Babe Ruth All-Star 2010 state championship team (Thomas Miller, Cody Hunt, Gage Hales, Ryan Basham and Cartas). Pitching depth (Bruner, Hunter Britt, Blake Gettings, Basham, Harper, Miller, Wood, Lucas Dean and Holliday) is the greatest asset of the 2013 Cougars, who head to state sporting a 1.99 earned run average.
They also have a head coach (Ethan Meguiar) who has played in a state tournament, who played four years of college baseball, and who passed the 300-win mark this season during his 17th year as head coach of the Cougars. Meguiar has a highly experienced staff who have worked with him for several years in Kyle Wall, Travis Anderson and Adam Decker.
The 1989 Cougars did have a veteran, highly successful head coach in David Billingsley, but most of the other characteristics of regional contenders were missing. Pitcher Mark Thompson, who went on to become a star on the University of Kentucky mound and then had an excellent professional baseball career, had great potential, but he had never quite put it all together going into his senior year. Jeff Taylor, Brian White and Chris Johnson were thought to be capable possibilities on the mound, but none of them had excelled as yet. Centerfielder Jon Hollingsworth had probably enjoyed the best season of any of the Cougars the year before, but Billingsley’s team was short on experience. Several veteran players had graduated the year before. Thompson, Hollingsworth and Johnson were the only seniors.
The 1989 Cougars weren’t even expected to be the best team in Logan County. Coach Lou Kendall’s Russellville Panthers had reached the regional finals the year before and returned several key players from that team, including pitchers John Markham and Bobby Blackford. Markham, who had quarterbacked the 1987 Panthers to the state football finals and who went on to be a key pitcher for Western Kentucky University, suffered a shoulder injury and wasn’t available for mound duty virtually the entire season. Sportswriter Steve Merideth intimated in a column that the better team didn’t win the district when it was the Cougars, not the Panthers, who advanced.
The Cougars started slowly as expected. After regular season losses to the Panthers and Todd Central, their record was 5-9. Billingsley was so upset with their performance on a spring break road trip that he prohibited any conversation for the 10-12 hour bus ride home from Florida. That bleak ride is still the subject of conversations when those Cougars see each other.
Then the tide started turning. Thompson, who had sat out his senior basketball season to work on baseball even though he was Coach Barry Reed’s best offensive weapon, and Johnson started playing up to their potential and Hollingsworth got even better. Taylor developed into an excellent pitcher, too, giving the Cougars a tough one-two punch with Thompson
A key move was installing junior Mitch Whitescarver as the catcher. I wrote at the time, “He’s the team’s first catcher who is really a catcher rather than a converted outfielder. The coach quit worrying about getting hits from the catcher’s position” and relied on Whitescarver’s defense, his handling of the pitchers and his role as the field general.
The team won 11 of its final 12 games and finished 20-12.
The season could have ended in a hurry in the first game of the district tournament, which was held at Morgantown. (This was before the creation of Greenwood and South Warren; Butler County was in the 13th District and Franklin-Simpson the 14th District.) Thompson was locked into a tight pitcher’s duel with Butler County’s Charlie Felty, who pitched a four-hit, 1-0 loss against the Cougars. He walked one and hit a pair of batters.
Thompson also pitched a four-hitter, but his was a shutout. He struck out 16 Bears (the second time he had fanned that many in a game), including eight in a row. He didn’t walk or hit anyone.
The run scored when Felty hit cleanup hitter Alan Marksberry, who then stole second and went to third on a wild pitch. Doug Binkley—now a member of the Cougar faculty and football coaching staff—hit a fly ball that Butler outfielder Clint Clark first came in on. It sailed over his head and rolled to the wall while Marksberry came home with the game’s only tally. Johnson doubled but Binkley had to stop at third, and then Clark made a diving catch to keep the lead at one run.
The only other Cougar baserunners were Jermaine Wells, who singled and was hit by a pitch, and Taylor, who walked and gave way to pinch runner Roger Steen.
Felty tried to tie the game on offense, but Whitescarver threw him out on an attempted steal.
Butler County Coach Mark Allen, who was to succeed the late Stumpy Baker as LCHS football coach a couple of years later, said it was the best game his 3-19 Bears had played all season.
If Butler County had won that game, history would have been altered in more ways than just a regional championship. The University of Kentucky didn’t scout Thompson until he pitched in the sub-state tournament. Had they never seen him, he probably wouldn’t have been a starting SEC pitcher or the Colorado Rockies’ number two pick in the franchise’s first draft three years later.
After surviving that scare, the Cougars won the district championship with ease, crushing Todd Central 18-0.Taylor pitched a 3-hit, 10-strikeout jewel. Hollingsworth slammed a two-run homer and a two-run double among his three hits, and he scored three runs. Thompson added a pair of doubles and five RBIs. Wells had two hits. Johnson and Lamont Cross each scored three runs.
When the Cougars drew homestanding Bowling Green High in the first round of the regional tournament, the Bowling Green Daily News quoted BGH coach Steve Long as saying, “I couldn’t have gotten a better draw if I had taken a pencil and written down the draw myself.” He hoped to use ace Jeff Watt on the mound briefly, build a lead and coast to a win.
Instead Logan Count y won 4-3. Thompson pitched six innings of two-hit shutout ball, but when the first two Purples reached base and the third had a 2-1 count, Billingsley switched him and first baseman Taylor. The junior lefty got the first two batters he faced out, but the Purples’ Brian Lawrence hit a two-run triple that pulled the Purples within one. Billingsley then implemented the switch again, sending Taylor back to first and returning Thompson to the mound. Thompson responded by getting Eddie Sharer out to end the game.
Hollingsworth scored the first two Cougar runs, using his hitting and exceptional speed to make steals and draw throwing errors. He also tripled in young infielder Ethan Meguiar. Johnson then tripled in Hollingsworth for what proved to be the winning run.
Watt finished the season with a 6-2 record. Both of his losses were to the Cougars.
Taylor started the semifinals on the mound and worked three scoreless innings in a 13-2 win over Cumberland County. Johnson pitched the next three innings and gave up the two runs on four hits. White pitched a scoreless, hitless seventh inning to send the Cougars to their first appearance in the finals.
Meguiar scored the 13th run on a walk, error and wild pitch.
The Cougars met Coach Greg Shelton’s Franklin-Simpson Wildcats in the finals, just as Meguiar’s 2000 team did in the program’s next regional finals berth. Taylor and Thompson combined on a seven-hitter in a 7-4 win. It was Logan’s third win of the season over an F-S team which had many of the same players who were soon to lead Shelton’s Cats to a state championship, including star pitcher Craig Allen and catcher James Davis.
Thompson struck out seven Cats in four innings, setting a Logan season record of 82 strikeouts in the process. Taylor—known to teammates and fans as ‘Luther’—brought a 5-2 record and a 1.26 earned run average to the mound in relief.
Binkley was on base four times, and Johnson stole home as Marksberry walked when he faked a suicide squeeze. The team did a lot of running. Assistant Coach James Powell had convinced them to dive into base on a close play, and it worked.
Hollingsworth threw out Michael Lane at the plate from centerfield, and the Cougars were able to contain the talented Janos Briscoe.
Next came the substate. Instead of all 16 regional champions going to Lexington as they do now, 12 of them were eliminated in four substate quadrants. Billingsley’s squad went to the Owensboro Apollo field to meet the champions of the first three regions.
Their first opponents were the Henderson County Colonels, who had scored 67 runs on 50 hits to win the Second Region. Thompson shut them down, allowing only one run in a 6-1 Logan win. He had one monumental battle with outfielder Hep Patterson, who fouled off four 0-2 pitches before Thompson struck him out. Thompson struck out 11 Colonels, running his total to 93 on the season. (Bruner leads the current Cougars with 73 strikeouts in 11 starts, more than twice as many as any teammate.) Thompson did walk two batters in the third inning, but Whitescarver threw them both out on attempted steals.
The Cougars scored two runs in the first inning. Johnson singled and Marksberry doubled him in. Binkley then drove in Marksberry with what proved to be the winning run. Wells hit a line drive off Henderson County pitcher Scott Kurtz’s knee, knocking him out of the game. White worked a walk in a nine-pitch at bat.
Billingsley pulled off one of his pet plays, getting a runner on first to pretend he was too far from the bag. He had worked that successfully in the 1982 district tournament on the legendary “get back, Rocky (Cook), get back” scam. This time the runner was Steen, who drew the throw, and Meguiar stole home on the play. Meguiar became a base-stealing machine while playing for Campbellsville University.
Binkley and Marksberry each had two hits, an RBI and a run scored. Hollingsworth and Wells each had two hits.
The win was the 11th in a row for the team which had started 5-9. They became the first team from the Land of Logan to play in the state baseball tournament in 44 years. Olmstead had been invited to state during World War II. They were also the last team from here to earn a state berth until this year.
The end was not pretty. Owensboro Senior’s Red Devils won the state quarterfinals game 18-2. Logan led 1-0 when Hollingsworth walked and Johnson reached on an error. Hollingsworth was out at the plate but Johnson scored on two wild pitches as Billingsley and Powell had their team running.
The other run scored in the second when Binkley was hit by a pitch, Wells singled and the Red Devils booted a ball at third. Coach Gene Vanhoose pulled starter Chad Gesser, who had come into the game with an 11-1 record.
After that , it was all Senior High. Taylor was the starting pitcher for Logan. White, Binkley and Johnson also pitched.
Other key players on that team were Chip Devasher and Jason Goodman. Young reserves included Scott Reed, Chris Hines, Brad Huskisson and Jerry ‘Bubba’ Rust.
Many players on that team have set great examples for this year’s regional champions. Mark Thompson, of course, is legendary as the only major leaguer ever to come from Logan County. Doug Binkley was a three-time All-American football player at Cumberland University. Jeff Taylor pitched four years for Austin Peay State University. Brad Huskisson is a head NCAA softball coach. Brian White is an officer of Auburn Banking Company and is a former president of the Logan County Chamber of Commerce. Chris Johnson is a business owner and a civic leader in Lewisburg. Scott Reed has put together a distinguished military career. Alan Marksberry is a teacher and has been a coach and school principal. Many of the others have been valuable and steady employees for their companies and great parents and husbands.
Billingsley, himself, became head of the state vocational and technical schools. Now retired and living in the Bluegrass, he attended this year’s semifinals game against his alma mater, Glasgow.
During the first seven years of LCHS, regional finals and state berths had become somewhat commonplace. The girls basketball team played their way to the regional finals four times in those seven years, reaching the state quarterfinals twice. Thompson’s dad, Jim, coached the first regional finalists. In fact, Coach Mike Haynes’ Lady Cougars had won the region and a game at state two months earlier in 1989. The boys basketball team had been to the finals twice, once under Reed’s dad Barry and the other with Coach Gerald Sinclair’s team winning the state championship in ’84.
Then the school went almost 20 years without another regional champion before the volleyball team coached by Tina Phelps and Steven Lyne won the region and a match at state in 2008. Coach Greg Howard’s cross country team has won the last two regional titles. Now Meguiar’s diamond squad has added to the legacy.
Excitement abounds for this team. Logan County fans spilled out on to the patio and into the adjoining section of the stands at Nick Denes Field for the regional championship game. They filled the patio standing section along the base line. Many are expected to go to Lexington Tuesday for the state opener against highly regarded Louisville St. Xavier.
WRUS radio will cover the 12:30 p.m. game live with Chris McGinnis and Ben Brown manning the headsets.