The boys varsity baseball team’s season has been mostly on the successful side this year. The Atoms had the third best record in the conference with a 13-7 record during the regular season.

The Atoms were able to close out their regular season by winning two of their last three games. After the regular season the boys prepared for the conference quarterfinals as they had earned a bye for the first round of the tournament.

The Atoms watched their competition from a distance and ended up facing the T.C. Williams Titans in the conference quarterfinals round. The boys took on the Titans on May 16 at home in a nail biting match-up.

The game was very close but the Atoms were able to take the lead after senior Tucker Mack delivered with a big hit and Colin Corey hit a home-run in the 6th inning. The boys beat T.C. Williams for the third time this year by a score of  5-4 to advance to the next round in the conference tournament.

In the conference semifinals round, the Atoms were up to take on the Lake Braddock Bruins on May 18. The Bruins had a very successful season themselves, going 15-5 in the regular season .

The Atoms had lost to the Bruins on two different occasions this season prior to the semifinals; on April 8 the Atoms were defeated by Lake Braddock 5-7 and lost to them again on May 3 by a score of 0-3.

The boys worked hard in preparation for the semifinals but at last were no match for the Bruins.

The Atoms lost on May 18 to the Bruins 0-11. This meant that the Atoms would be eliminated from the conference tournament but would still be able to compete in the regional tournament.

After a tough loss in the semis, the team set up to play the Centreville Wildcats in the first round of the regional tournament.

The Atoms fought hard to keep their season alive against the Wildcats but were not able to pull out the win. The game was extremely tight and close but the Wildcats slimmed by the Atoms by a very close score of 3-2.

“The game was really close but we didn’t play to our full potential and we lost Colin (Corey) in the third inning which hurt us,” senior Aaron Boyd said.

Colin Corey who will be playing Division three baseball at Lynchburg University next year was one of the team’s most productive players and losing him during the game was a major blow the team couldn’t afford.

The boys were disappointed by the close loss to Centreville but still had a great season overall. They had some big wins over great teams and were very proud of those games.

“As a whole, this baseball season was great, we didn’t quite reach our goals but we won a lot of games and had a blast and grew close as a team,” Boyd said.

The baseball team will have some players moving on to continue to play baseball at the collegiate level. Senior Tim Johnson will be playing Division 1 baseball at St. Joseph’s University and Grant Thompson and Colin Corey will continue their baseball careers to play Division 3 at Shenandoah University and Lynchburg University.

With many talented seniors leaving the team now that the season has ended, the Atoms could possibly have a problem on their hands.

Out of the 16  athletes on the varsity baseball team, 12 of them were seniors. This leaves only few experienced athletes who have played varsity for next season.  It will interesting to see how the Atoms handle this issue next year.