Weeki Wachee baseball routs Central 14-4 in district semifinal

Weeki Wachee turned an early wobble into a postseason statement Wednesday at the Hornets’ Nest, pounding Central 14-4 in five innings to reach the Class 4A District 6 title game.

For a couple of innings, the semifinal looked unsettled. Then the Hornets found their rhythm, and the score quickly turned from tense to lopsided. Head coach Patrick McHugh called the opening stretch a “roller coaster,” a fitting description for a game that changed once Weeki Wachee stopped trading punches and started landing them.

Brayton Crews was part of that shift. The Hornets got a strong two-way effort from the junior, who pitched 2.2 innings without allowing an earned run or a hit and also scored three runs as Weeki Wachee kept piling on. Once the Hornets gained control, Central had no answer for the pace of the inning-to-inning avalanche.

The result mattered because of where it came in the bracket. Weeki Wachee entered the tournament as the No. 1 seed, Central as the No. 5, and the Hornets improved to 12-10 by handling a playoff game at home in front of a crowd that knew exactly what was at stake. This was not just another win in the ledger. It was a step toward keeping the season alive and protecting home field in a district that included Hudson, Pasco, Fivay and Gulf.

The semifinal also fit a season-long pattern. Central entered at 4-21 and had already lost four straight to Weeki Wachee. The Hornets had swept the Bears earlier in the regular season, winning 15-6 and 6-0, so the playoff matchup only reinforced the gap between the teams.

Weeki Wachee followed the semifinal by hosting Hudson in the district championship game, the first district title game ever played at the program. The Hornets fell 7-3, but the run still gave the county program a milestone moment and showed how quickly the Hornets can turn a close game into a rout once they settle in.