This is professional baseball. Thursday night, the Cloverleafs needed a win to put them over the top for their division. They got it. Bringing their season record to 17-15, the Leafs clinched a northern division title with their 4-0 defeat of the Baton Rouge River Bats.

Starting pitcher Steve Shippey, who replaced scheduled pitcher Terry Waters, pitched a nine-inning shutout, striking out seven. The right-hander, relatively new to the Selma team, started out the game on a good foot with a called-third strike strikeout of Baton Rouge leadoff man Hutch Sutter.

The Leafs were on fire offensively last night, scoring two of their four total runs in the bottom of the first inning and one in the bottom of the third. The first two runs came from a leadoff double by Selma second baseman Keith Sills, which put him in scoring position and allowed him to score on a rip to right field by Joe Colvin. Colvin made it to third on a River Bat error, and he scored on a grounder to third by first baseman Joe Whitmer. Selma scored its two runs on two hits for the first inning.

In the bottom of the second inning, Selma right fielder Jose Colon hit a solo home run, his fourth of the year, off of Baton Rouge’s right-handed starter Darrin Babineaux to up the score to 3-0.

Innings began to fly by after that as both Selma and Baton Rouge were stuck in a non-scoring stalemate. Due to solid pitching on both sides of the field, the 3-0 score remained unchanged until the bottom of the eighth inning.

With two outs in the bottom of the eighth, designated hitter Brock Lowell cranked one over the right field fence to keep an 11-game hitting streak alive and well. The streak looked bleak until that point–Lowell was 0-for-3 on the night before the home run, his fifth of the year.

Now, Selma cruises into the All-Star break in the number-one spot for the northern division of their league. They captured the win that made them 17-15 in front of a crowd of over 300 fans on Thursday night.

The Selma Cloverleafs now have a weekend to rest and enjoy the All-Star break, with festivities on Friday and Saturday night at Paterson Field in Montgomery. Tuesday night, Selma resumes play, hitting the road for a three-game series with the Montgomery Wings.