Horns' baseball season ends in district tournament

Johnson County's Kaden Blevins pitched a gem, but Chuckey-Doak's Lynkin Cutshaw was even better while ending Blevins' impressive high school career. Cutshaw pitched a two-hit shutout and the Black Knights eked out a 2-0 victory in a District 1-2A elimination game on Thursday at Northeast Tennessee Credit Union Ballpark. Blevins also pitched a two-hitter. He allowed one earned run while striking out five and walking four. Blevins, who will continue his career at Emory & Henry University, also had one of the Longhorns' two hits. He finished the season batting .548 and slugging .847. He drove in 34 runs. And Blevins was hampered by a biceps injury this season. "We have not had an all-state baseball player in 20 years," Johnson County second-year coach Nick Perkins said. "That was Nate Paisley in 2006. Well, Kaden Blevins deserves to make the all-state team. He had a great junior season and followed it up with an even better senior year, especially considering the biceps injury. "We tip our cap to Linkyn Cutshaw. He was very, very good, and we just couldn't get anything going at all. And if we had any flickers of hope, they quickly were dashed away." The Longhorns opened the district with a 7-6 defeat of Happy Valley on Tuesday at Pete Pavusek Memorial Stadium. Blevins, Carson Jennings, Brock Jones and Sawyer Marshall each tallied two hits, and Chris Wilson drove in two runs. "We won 17 baseball games and we had a really nice playoff win," Perkins said. "We so appreciate our fans, our students, our administration. It was just a great crowd." Top-seeded Unicoi County knocked the 'Horns into the losers' bracket with a 10-0 victory at Baxter Field on Wednesday. In that game, Chris Wilson made an impressive play to throw a runner out at the plate from center field. "Chris Wilson was a weapon for us in center field," Perkins said. The loss to Chuckey-Doak was an especially bitter pill to swallow. Even without the big bat of Avery Jones in the postseason lineup due to surgery, Perkins was confident his team could claim the second region berth. "It cuts deep," Perkins said. "It's just tough to swallow. We had a good team. I continue to talk about great team chemistry and camaraderie. "We battled everyone in the conference. Really, other than maybe one conference loss, we could have realistically won every conference loss that we had. We had a competitive baseball team. It's very tough to have only played three district games in our tournament. I hate it for our ball club. I hate it for our seniors." Along with Blevins, the senior class includes Jones, Wilson, Carson Jennings, Ethan Smith and Colten Grindstaff. "I can't say it enough how much we're gonna miss our seniors, led by the magnificent leadership of Kaden Blevins and Carson Jennings," Perkins said. "But we do like our ball club that is returning. The cupboard is not bare. We are returning a competitive baseball team in 2027. "We really like the pitching we're bringing back. We must continue to improve offensively. And we must improve offensively against quality arms."