Hand hopes to get Red Bay ‘over the hump’
For each of the past two seasons, the Red Bay Tigers baseball team has registered 20-plus wins and made deep playoff runs. In both of those years, the Tigers saw their season end at the hands of the Mars Hill Panthers — in the final four in 2024 and then in the elite eight in 2025.
Before his Tigers can even think about revenge on the Panthers, head coach Donovan Hand’s squad will have to first go through a tough threeteam area consisting of Sulligent and Lamar County. In order to come out of their area, the Tigers will rely on a bevy of talent on both sides of the baseball.
Offensively, Red Bay will be led by seniors Jeremiah Thorne, Aiden Pruitt and Landyn Lewey, along with junior Carson McGee. All four are returning starters from last season’s elite eight squad.
Riley Carpenter, Landon Petree and Sawyer Humphries are replacing starters lost to graduation, but Hand said he’s been encouraged by what he’s seen so far with his lineup.
“The first four or five guys in our lineup are going to really anchor us and the other guys kind of work around them,” Hand said. “They’ve grown a lot so far, and I look for them to continue to get better.”
When the calendar turns over to area play at the beginning of April, Hand said he is confident in his starting rotation.
A former Major League Baseball pitcher with the Milwaukee Brewers and Cincinnati Reds, Hand said he has a plethora of guys who he can turn to get an out or two.
McGee and Thorne – both returning arms – will pair up with Lewey and Pruitt to round out the four-man rotation.
“They’re all interchangeable,” Hand said. “We’ve got about seven or eight guys that I feel comfortable using and each of those guys gives us a chance to win. So, our staff is pretty deep.”
Hand said leading up to area play, Red Bay’s schedule gets more intense.
“That stretch of games will hopefully get us ready for anything that’s thrown at us in our area,” Hand said. “Lamar County has a good team, and Sulligent is solid and playing good lately. It’s just more about what we do and not what other teams are doing.”
In the event everything comes together for Hand and the Tigers, Red Bay could be on the verge of something special – at least that’s what their head coach hopes for.
“We’ve been right there for the past few years,” Hand said. “We’ve been so close and I’m hoping that this is the year we finally get over the hump.”
