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A nice late March evening saw Fluvanna County travel to Orange County for an early-season Jefferson District matchup. Both teams started juniors, with Fluvanna sending lefty Andrew Ward to the mound and Orange tabbing righty Brett Jennings for the start. Ward would dominate the first portion of the game and Fluvanna would build a 5-1 lead before Orange roared back in the last two innings to walk-off with a 6-5 win.

Orange got on the board first in the bottom of the first inning when Tucker Hensley got on base with a two-out single to left and Keenan Williams (UNC Pembrooke) ripped a double to left center. Hensley was being held at third but the relay got away from the Fluvanna shortstop and he scampered home with the game's first run, giving Orange an early 1-0 lead.

Aside from that quick strike offense by Orange, the story of the first three innings was the two pitchers. Ward struck out eight batters in the first three innings, allowing only an attempted bunt single into play aside from that first inning offense. Not to be outdone, Jennings was perfect through the first three innings, inducing five groundouts and getting a pair of strikeouts as well.

In the top of the fourth, Jennings finally allowed a baserunner when Ryan Groome (Virginia Wesleyan) led the inning off with a double to right-center. Ward then ripped a deep fly to center that would have been out of most parks but was nearly caught, going for a double but only allowing Groome to advance to third. Jennings got a strikeout and a dribbler in front of the plate, but a bold Groome scored when Orange's catcher threw to first to tie the game. An error scored a second run and later in the inning, Mason Gross drove in another run with a two-out single to make the score 3-1.

After that first inning, Ward locked in and shut down Orange. He would go five innings total, allowing only one more hit, again by Williams, and running his strikeout total up to 13 for the day against no walks. The Fluccos would add two more runs in the top of the fifth, with Ward delivering and RBI single and Cameron Shields driving in another run on a sacrifice fly. 

Headed to the bottom of the sixth, Fluvanna held a 5-1 lead and opted to go to the pen and bring in junior Toby Sherman. Sherman sandwiched two outs around a pair of singles, and Jennings drove a run in to help his own cause and cut the lead to 5-2, but after a stolen base by courtesy runner Hylton Hale put two in scoring position with two outs, Canon Davies (Mary Washington) delivered both runs with a single to left, cutting the score to 5-4 at the end of the sixth.

Orange went to the pen in the top of the seventh, bringing on Caleb Fincham, who got the first batter out but then loaded the bases with a single, walk, and hit-by-pitch. With Fluvanna threatening to add insurance, Orange brought Davies in to pitch. The Fluccos tried a suicide squeeze on the first play and the bunt was missed, leading to Williams just being able to get the tag down in time for the second out. Davies got a ground out to escape the inning with the score still 5-4.

Sherman got a strikeout to open the seventh and put Devin Champion in a two-strike hole before he was able to fight a single into right center. That turned the lineup over for Christian Koontz, who doubled down the leftfield line to put two runners in scoring position. Fluvanna made a pitching change, bringing in Kyle Algieri, and he was welcomed by Kyle Johnson who flared a ball into right for a base hit to drive in the tying run. That brought up Hensley, who chopped a ball to the right side of a drawn-in infield, and Koontz was able to beat the throw to the plate with the winning run for Orange.

For the Fighting Hornets, Hensley was 2-4 with an RBI, Davies was 1-3 with 2 RBIs and was the winning pitcher. Jennings went 6 IP, 5 R, 5 H, 3 BB, 4 K and was 1-3 with an RBI. 

For Fluvanna, Andrew Ward went 5 IP, 1 R, 3 H, 0 BB, 13 K, and was 2-4 with a 2B and an RBI. Gross was 2-4 with an RBI. Groome was 1-3 with a 2B, a BB, and 2 R.