HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Braxton Burke collected his second win of the state tournament as St. Albans booked their spot in the Class AAA state championship game with a 3-2 win over Shady Spring in the second semifinal. The No. 2 Red Dragons will face No. 4 Ripley Saturday at 5:30 p.m. The Vikings knocked off top-seeded Bridgeport, 5-1 earlier Friday.
“Great game by Shady. Our guys just battled and were gritty,” said St. Albans head coach Rick Whitman. “They got some timely hits with two outs. We pitched really well too. Our guys just pounded the zone. I don’t think we walked a single hitter. This time of year, that’s huge.”
After picking up the victory in relief in St. Albans’s 1-0, eight-inning win over John Marshall on Tuesday, Burke logged six effective innings before yielding to Gavin Comer to collect the final three outs in the seventh.
Chance Campbell drove in two of the three runs for St. Albans. His RBI single in the first inning scored Comer to give the Red Dragons an early 1-0 lead. Campbell later scored on a wild pitch, doubling the lead to 2-0.
In the fifth, Campbell sent Burke to the plate with his second RBI single, putting St. Albans up 3-0.
“Big two-out hit by Campbell. We bunted the guy over and didn’t get him in right away. But Chance came through with a big two-out hit.”
Shady Spring (28-8) pushed two runs across the plate in the sixth inning by collecting five hits. Eli Naylor and Noah Fox had back-to-back run-scoring hits to pull the Tigers within a run. Burke stranded two runners aboard in the sixth.
“They had seen [Burke] three times and started barreling some balls up on him in that last inning. They found a couple holes. I just felt like he did everything he could possibly do for us. We had Gavin in relief and that has kind of been his role since early in the year to come in and close it out for us.”
With back-to-back one-run state tournament victories, the Red Dragons will play in the state final for the first time since 2019 Saturday against the 2025 champions.
“Defending state champs. What else is there to say? We’re excited to be in the championship game. We’ll play seven innings tomorrow and see what happens.”
Tyler Wilhite pitched a complete game for the Tigers. He allowed seven hits and struck out four batters.