Salas’ walk-off homer gives Darton split with Georgia Perimeter

ALBANY — Darton State had been swinging and missing for six straight innings against Georgia Perimeter star pitcher Dustin Beggs’ slider on Saturday.

Eventually, Luis Salas swung at one and didn’t miss.

The Darton second baseman connected on one of Beggs’ menacing sliders on the second pitch of the seventh inning and sent it soaring over the left-field wall for a walk-off home run, giving the Cavs a 2-1 victory in the second game of a doubleheader.

“Beggs threw a fastball for strike one, and Salas just missed it,” Darton coach Scot Hemmings explained. “He had been following a lot of his fastballs with sliders, so Salas sat on a slider and hit it about 380 feet the other way. It was an absolute beautiful piece of hitting.”

It wrapped up a four-game series between Region XVII’s top two teams that featured two tight games that came down to the final swing and two blowouts. After losing to Darton 10-0 Friday night, Georgia Perimeter paid back the Cavs with a 10-1 victory in Saturday’s opening game.

Salas, however, evened the series at 2-2 with his seventh-inning swing.

Moments after the walk-off homer and as the players were exchanging post-game handshakes, the scene turned tense as the teams began to shout at each other. In an incident that could have quickly turned ugly, the coaching staffs separated the teams before it turned physical.

“That was two very competitive teams that got a little emotional at the end,” Hemmings said. “Nothing really happened. The players and coaches did a good job of not letting the situation escalate. It was an emotional series, and it got a little heated in the walk-through as they were shaking hands.”

The 14th-ranked Cavs leave the series 2