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NATCHEZ — Tanner Wimberly was a force at the plate for Cathedral High School’s varsity baseball team in the Green Wave’s home wins over both Natchez High School and Centerville Academy earlier this week.

In the battle of cross-town rivals Natchez High and Cathedral at Chester Willis Field last Tuesday night, the Green Wave was the ‘home’ team on this occasion and Wimberly was one of the driving forces behind its 12-2 win in five innings over the Bulldogs.

Wimberly went 2-for-3 with a triple, three runs batted in, and one run scored. Jacob Smith also had himself a stellar performance at the plate, going 2-for-3 with one RBI and three runs scored. So did Josh Ingram, who was 1-for-3 with a double, three RBIs, and one run scored.

Cathedral jumped out to a 6-0 lead on Natchez High in the first inning, but new Green Wave head coach Andrew Beesley said was some things he liked and did not like about his team’s performance.

“I thought we played some parts of the game well. Other parts, like finishing the game we’ve got to get better at.” Beesley said. “We’re still pitching well and playing good defense. But I would like to see us swing the bats better. It’s just like we jump on a team early and then we (relax). I would like to see us swing the bats late in the game like we do early in the game.”

Winning pitcher Noah Russ went all five innings for the Green Wave and didn’t give up a run in the first four innings. He gave up two runs, both of the earned, in the top of the fifth inning. He only surrendered three total base hits, struck out eight, and walked just two batters.

“He had eight strikeouts and two walks, which was pretty good,” Beesley said.

Despite struggling to get out of the first inning, Jaylin Davis went four and two-thirds innings and gave up 12 runs on seven hits and struck out eight batters.

Cathedral improved to 8-0 and next plays at Wilkinson County Christian Academy on Friday with the junior varsity game at 4 p.m., followed by the varsity game at 6 p.m.

Natchez High dropped to 4-2 overall and next plays at the Lincoln County Tournament on Saturday at Enterprise Attendance Center in Brookhaven with its opponent and time to be determined.

Cathedral 9, Centreville Academy 1 (Monday)

NATCHEZ — Tanner Wimberly went 2-for-3 with a triple, four RBIs, and two runs scored while Jake Maples threw a complete-game masterpiece to lead the Cathedral High School Green Wave to a 9-1 win over the Centreville Academy Tigers at Chester Willis Field last Monday night.

Maples pitched all seven innings for Cathedral, giving up one earned run on two hits, struck out 14 batters, and walked just one batter. Centreville Academy’s only run came in the top of the third inning to make it a 4-1 game, but that would be as close as the Tigers would get.

“I thought Jake pitched lights out the other night,” Beesley said. “He ended up with 14 strikeouts and gave u just one run, which is quite impressive for a seven-inning game.

Walker Probst went 2-for-2 with a double and three runs scored while Jake Hairston was 1-for-3 with a double and three RBIs. Still, Beesley said he wants his team to put the ball in play more and strike out less.

“Once again, I don’t think we hit the ball particularly well. We’ve got to limit the number of strikeouts at the plate. If we can put the bats together with the pitching staff we’ve got, which is very good, we can win a lot of ball games” Beesley said.