The regular season certainly wasn’t pretty for the Sulphur Tors baseball team.

They won five of their first 20 games and entered the postseason with a losing record for the first time since 2021. But what they lacked in wins the Tors made up with a quality schedule that is paying dividends. At No. 20, the Tors are the lowest-seeded team remaining in the playoffs in all classes and divisions.

“We were prepared,” Sulphur head coach Thomas Tillery said. “Our record, by any means, wasn’t good in the regular season. We finished 16-18. But we knew if we got in, we were going to be a scary opponent for a lot of teams.”

The Tors swept two best-of-three series to open the playoffs and won both on the road, including last week when they knocked off No. 4 Haughton. The Tors (20-18) will go for upset No. 3 when they open a best-of-three quarterfinal series at No. 5 Benton (33-3) at 7 p.m. today. Game 2 will be at 7 p.m. Friday and the third game, if necessary, at noon Saturday. Benton was a state semifinalist last season.

“They’re similar to us when it comes to some of the attributes they have,” Tillery said. “Really deep on the mound and have some front-line arms.

“But this is probably the fastest team that we’ve played when it comes to team speed — getting on the bases, running the bases, bunting. We just have to control the running game, eliminate free passes, eliminate errors, and then try to get the timely hit and execute when we’re on offense against their good pitchers.”

The Tors’ pitching staff has been strong in the postseason with a 1.55 earned run average, led by seniors Slade ShoveKnox and Dayton Hicks and junior Carter Wilson.

“Our pitching is built for a three-game series with this new format, for the playoff, for the best two out of three,” Tillery said. “We have a ton of depth on the mound and some front-line arms that can go deep into a ballgame.

“And if we need to go to the bullpen, we have guys that can come in and do different things to get out. So we like where we fell in the draw, you know, with being a 20 seed, because we felt like our road to get back home was doable.”
Hicks has pitched six or more innings twice in the postseason, including a shutout of Haughton in Game 1 in the regional round, and Shove-Knox went 6 1/3 innings in the second game of the series. Wilson has seen time as a starter and reliever. He has pitched three scoreless relief innings in the postseason and earned a win in the bi-district round and a save last week.

Strong districts

Of the seven Southwest Louisiana teams that will play in a best-of-three quarterfinals series this weekend, six come from two districts.

District 3-3A has three teams in the quarterfinals in Non-select No. 3 South Beauregard (22-10) and No. 4 Westlake (24-10) and Select Division III No. 5 St. Louis Catholic (16-18).

Non-select No. 2 Barbe (32-4), No. 11 Sam Houston (31-7) and No. 20 Sulphur hail from District 3-5A, which has a fourth team still alive in Select No. 10 Acadiana.

Home-field advantage

Four area teams will have the advantage of playing at home in the quarterfinals.

Westlake is playing in the quarterfinals for a third consecutive season and looks to benefit from hosting after losing road series in 2023 and ’24 to Sterlington and Kinder. The Rams open their series with No. 5 Kaplan at 6 p.m. today.

At No. 11, Sam Houston is the lowest-seeded team hosting in the quarterfinals. The Broncos upset defending state champion No. 6 West Monroe last week while their opponent, No. 19 Slidell, knocked off No. 3 Northwood-Shreveport. The series will start at 6 p.m. Friday.

Barbe hosts No. 10 Dutchtown at 7 p.m. Friday, looking to extend its 26-game win streak.

South Beauregard hosts No. 6 Berwick starting at 6 p.m. Friday after the Golden Knights needed three games to beat Loreauville in the regional round.