From staff reports

The Troup County all-stars made it look easy.

After winning a pair of games in blowout fashion to make it to the championship round of the Junior Dixie Boys Baseball state tournament, Troup County dismantled Newton County 10-4 Tuesday night in Covington to collect the state title in the 13-year-old division.

Troup County advances to the Dixie World Series that will be played in Enterprise, Ala. beginning Aug. 1.

“People always talk about teams peaking at the right time, and they’re peaking right now,” Troup coach Andy Buchanan said. “Hopefully we can carry that on. It’ll be cool to represent Troup County in the World Series.”

Tuesday’s game did hold a bit more suspense than the previous two games when Troup County won by a combined score of 22-3.

Newton County actually held a 4-2 lead before Troup exploded for eight runs in the fifth inning.

Caleb Buchanan had the big hit in the fifth, a bases-loaded triple that brought in three runs.

Matt Morton jump-started the eight-run rally with a double.

“We’re proud of the boys,” Buchanan said. “We didn’t know if we were going to be the most talented team, but we wanted to be the smartest and most fundamenal team. The boys showed that they were, whether it was sacrifice bunts, making the plays in the field, being aware. We picked a guy off because we were alert with the ball. That made me the most proud, and (assistant coaches Matt Aldridge and Jeff Buchanan) as well, that we got the simple things right.”

Morton pitched the first five innings to get the win, and he struck out seven batters.

Dustin Vaught made the lead stand up by pitching two scoreless innings.

There were plenty of offensive heroes, including Buchanan, who had two hits with three RBIs.

Clayton Vaught, Carson Aldridge each had two hits and Jaylen Colton each had two hits.

Dustin Vaught, Morton, Chas Pardue and Dre Leonard each had one hit.

In the field, Buchanan said Colton “made a couple of great plays in the hole at shortstop.”

As was the case in the previous two games, every player on the team offered something, whether it was a key hit, a sacrifice bunt or a critical defensive play.

“We got them all in, and they all contributed,” Buchanan said.