East Webster set to continue playoffs at Strayhorn today

By DANNY P. SMITH
sdnsports@bellsouth.net [1]

Strayhorn can expect to see a very dangerous baseball team in the second round of the Class 2A series today.
The East Webster Wolverines have already been tested far worse this week than anything they'll see on the baseball field over the next few days.
After the events of the past week with the storm that severely damaged the East Webster High School campus in Cumberland, the Wolverines believe having to go through the situation will make the people of the community stronger.
East Webster baseball coach Wes Johnson has no doubt that those who support the school are committed to moving forward.
"You don't want to see it happen to anybody, but the way I feel about it is if it had to happen to somebody, our community is strong enough and our faculty is strong enough that we'll be better in the long run," Johnson said. "We have the support of our administration. We'll build (the campus) back and we'll get after it, build things back and try to make it better than it was."
The baseball field is damaged enough that it's not possible to continue the playoffs in Cumberland.
The Wolverines are set to play at Strayhorn today (4:30 p.m.), but the second game of the series will be held at Houston Saturday (1 p.m.).
As tough as it was for East Webster to lose property, Johnson said they were "really blessed," that the storm came at a time of morning when there weren't people at the school.
"We didn't have a lot of people killed or injured," Johnson said. "The people over at Smithville had it much worse than we did. We feel fortunate that we were able to just lose property and not life."
Johnson didn't see his players Wednesday, but had tried to schedule a practice for Thursday afternoon at Ackerman.
After taking two out of three games in the first round against Hollandale-Simmons, East Webster has an overall record of 17-6.
Johnson believes baseball will serve as a good distraction for the Wolverines after having to deal with the aftermath of the storm.
"We're going to treat this thing as it being an out for us," Johnson said. "We'll get our minds off all of this other stuff for a couple of hours and it will be refreshing for me and the kids to get out there and have fun. That's how we're going to approach this series too."