By JOHNNY PEPPO

Sports Editor

EDGARD – West St. John was three outs away from their first win of the year on their home diamond Thursday afternoon until Donaldsonville turned it around in the top of the seventh inning, taking the lead with the winning run coming on a balk called with two outs already in the books. Coupled with a loss to St. James on Tuesday afternoon, Rams baseball had a rough week all around.

But you couldn’t tell it by talking to WSJ coach Lennix Madere.

&#8220Look, we got two eighth graders who played today,” said Madere, &#8220and one of them pitched for the first four innings. Carl Herbert and Barry Hanson. They’ll be around for a while and they can already contribute. We haven’t had that in a while.”

For now though, West St. John is putting a lot of stock in their batters.

And that was just nearly enough on Thursday as Class 1A WSJ held an 8-6 lead over 2A Donaldsonville going into the top of the seventh. The Tigers got their first batter on base after an overthrow to first base, but Daron Bartholomew, who came on in relief of freshman Carl Herbert after the fourth inning, got the second batter to pop out to second base. Donaldsonville kept themselves alive by getting a pair of base-runners on to threaten to retake the lead. They knocked in two runs to pull into the lead with a double to center field and got an insurance run when the umpire called a balk on Bartholomew just before he struck out the last batter to end the side.

&#8220That was a tough call,” said Madere. &#8220Thing is he wasn’t even on the rubber. If the ump doesn’t make that call, we’re looking at a whole different ball game.”

Bartholomew also led his team from the batter’s box, going 3-for-4 on the day.