By GEORGE MAHL

VACHERIE – The East St. John High School Wildcats and the St. James High School Wildcats were not supposed to play each other Wednesday afternoon. East St. John was supposed to play East Ascension High School and St. James was scheduled to play West St. John High School. But, due mostly to the weather, coaches Mackey Waguespack and Shane Trosclair agreed to play one another on short notice.

The game went into extra innings tied at 7-7 when darkness set in, thus forcing the game to end in a tie.

Trailing 6-4 in the bottom of the fifth, St. James mounted a comeback by scoring three in fifth and grabbing a 7-6 lead.

After eight hole hitter Marcus Oubre lead off the inning with a bunt, ESJ pitcher Patrick Millet walked the next three batters and forced in a run. Millet’s walk to Blake Falgoust walked in David Johnson from third. A sacrifice fly off the bat of Thadeus Sutherland scored lead off hitter Lionel Keller.

However, in the top of the seventh East St. John tied the score at 7-7. A triple by Kenny Robertson lead to him scoring on a sacrifice fly from Sebyron Daniels.

In the top of the bottom of the ninth, ESJ relief pitcher Alex McCollum got into a jam and almost let the game get away. With runners on first and second and no outs, David Johnson hit into a double play ending the game. It was the only double play of the game.

Things appeared to be getting off to a good start for the Reserve school. In the top of the first, Millet lead off by reaching first base on a Wildcat throwing error. Millet then scored on a double off the bat of Kenny Robertson. Then, Roberston, the ESJ cleanup hitter, scored from second when Daniels, the next batter, also doubled.

Two more runs in top of the second resulted in East St. John jumping out to a 4-0 lead. The big blow in the inning came off the bat of Ryan Perrilloux. His two run home run to center put ESJ up by four.

That lead, however, quickly evaporated in the bottom of the second. ESJ starting Dominick Thomas began to struggle on the mound. He struck out Jacques Vedol to lead off the inning, but struggled the rest of inning. He walked the next six batters, forcing in three more runs. In the second inning, St. James had three runs on no hits.

In the bottom of the fourth, St. James put another run on the board.

After Sutherland, the fourth hole hitter, reached base safely following an error, Edmond Morton, the next hitter, smacked a single scoring Sutherland from second base. This made the score 5-4 East St. John.

East St. John’s returns home today to place St. Charles Catholic at 11 a.m.