East Surry baseball secured both the conference championship and Player of the Year honors in its final season with the Northwest 1A Conference.
The Cardinals’ 2021 NW1A Conference Championship is the 18th conference championship in program history. Since the NW1A Conference formed ahead of the 2013-14 school year, East Surry has won the conference championship in baseball six times: 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2021.
The 2017 title was shared with Walkertown, and East finished second in the conference in 2016. No conference games were played 2020.
East Surry will compete in the 2A division for the next realignment cycle. The Cardinals will be in a conference with the following teams: North Surry, Surry Central, Forbush, Wilkes Central, North Wilkes and West Wilkes.
Mount Airy, South Stokes and North Stokes stay together and will welcome Alleghany, East Wilkes, Elkin and Starmount into their new conference. Bishop McGuinness and Winston-Salem Prep will compete in a new conference consisting of Bethany Community, Carver, Cornerstone Charter, Millennium Charter and N.C. Leadership Academy.
2021 NW1A Standings
East Surry won the 2021 NW1A Championship with an 11-1 conference record. After dropping its season-opener to South Stokes, the Cardinals won its next 12 regular-season games and its first three playoff games.
East reached the 1A State Championship Series for the fourth time in program history. The team dropped two games to Perquimans to finish State Runner-up with a 17-3 record.
The Cardinals’ 17-game winning streak featured three shutouts, nine games with a margin of victory of at least four runs and 13 games scoring at least seven runs.
South Stokes finished second int he conference with an 8-4 record. The Sauras took a win over East Surry to start the season, but lost its second two meetings against the Cardinals. South also lost to Mount Airy once and North Stokes once.
South ended the season by winning seven of its final eight games to finish 10-4 overall.
Bishop McGuinness and North Stokes tied for third in the conference with records of 4-8.
The Villains defeated North Stokes twice and Mount Airy twice, but lost all three meetings to both East Surry and South Stokes. North Stokes started the season with losses to Mount Airy, Bishop and South Stokes, but defeated all three in the teams’ second meeting. The Vikings’ defeated Mount Airy at the end of the season for its fourth conference win.
Bishop finished 5-9 overall, and North Stokes finished 6-8 overall.
Mount Airy finished fifth in the conference with a 3-9 record. The Granite Bears defeated both North Stokes and South Stokes in their first meetings against the Stokes County Schools, but lost the remaining games against the Vikings and Sauras.
The Bears’ third conference win came against Bishop McGuinness in the teams’ second meeting.
Winston-Salem Prep did not field a baseball team in 2021.
Player of the Year
East Surry sophomore Folger Boaz was named NW1A Conference Player of the Year for the 2021 season.
The left-handed pitcher is the 10th Cardinal player since 2013 to win the award. He joins: Drew Wilson in 2013, Scott Meredith and Tyler Marion (Co-POYs) in 2014, Tyler Marion in 2015, Tyler Smith in 2016 (Co-POY with Walkertown’s Robbie Robledo), AJ Wilson in 2017, Kain Kiser in 2018, AJ Wilson and Seth Keener (Co-POYs) in 2019.
Boaz, who’s verbally committed to play baseball at UNC-Chapel Hill, finished 6-0 on the mound, had a 1.75 earned run average and threw 69 strikeouts in 40 innings. He tied for third in the 1A division in wins, sixth in ERA (min. 40 innings pitched) and sixth in strikeouts.
His six wins tied for 11th in the state among all divisions.
At the plate, Boaz had a .406 batting average and .519 on-base percentage. The sophomore hit four doubles, four home runs and 26 RBIs while scoring 23 runs. He was fifth in both 1A and the state overall in RBIs, fifth in 1A and tied for 19th overall in home runs, and12th in 1A and 23rd overall in runs scored.
Coach of the Year
South Stokes’ Shane Worth was named NW1A Coach of the Year.
Worth led the Sauras to a second-place finish in the conference with an 8-4 record. South Stokes finished 10-4 overall.
The Sauras finished second in the conference in 2019 and fourth in 2018.
All-Conference and Honorable Mentions
Selections are sorted by school.
EAST SURRY
AC: Luke Bowman, Carson Willoughby, Luke Brown, Benji Gosnell, Trey Armstrong, Folger Boaz
HM: Evan McCreary, Anthony Ayers
SOUTH STOKES
AC: Tyler Patterson, Wesley Buck, Maddox Nelson, Jesse Carrick
HM: Connor Young, Cameryn Wilson
BISHOP MCGUINNESS
AC: Cian Hogan, Joe O’Connor
HM: Tommy Mattox
NORTH STOKES
AC: Dylan James, Christian Shemo
HM: Ethan Puckett, Bryson Bennett
MOUNT AIRY
AC: Reece McDuffie
HM: Logan Dowell
Source: https://www.mtairynews.com
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