The Ruston Bearcats (13) travel to Zachary (4) in a best of 3 matchup this weekend. Ruston will look to follow up a 2 game sweep of New Iberia last week in Round 1 of the LHSAA playoffs. We talked with Bearcat Head Coach Bryan Beck about the upcoming matchup. According to Coach Beck Zachary is full of athletes with power from the top to the bottom of their lineup. Some key players the Bearcats will need to control are Braden Sanders, a Grambling Commit, Madden McClure and Kam Bailey. All of these players are keys for the Bronco offense. On the defensive side, the Broncos have Noah Sullivan, a Louisiana Tech commit, who has been one of their most dominant arms. Zachary had last week off in the playoffs as the top seeds received a bye week. Coach Beck had equal praise for the Bearcats who got huge performances last week from their bats. Nolan Parnell and Sam Hartwell each went 5 for 7 with 5 RBIs a piece to lead the Bearcats at the plate. The Bearcats racked up 25 hits through 12 innings of baseball in the 2 games. They also got another complete game performance from Tyler Roach in a 13 - 3 victory in game 1 of the 2 game sweep. Coach Beck said “Successful preparation in practice is what makes us produce in games… (and) our bats are very confident right now”. He credited the success this season to the group of Seniors who have kept practice intense leading up to the playoffs allowing for the team to compete with intensity. The Bearcats will need that intensity this week. Against New Iberia the Bearcats plated 10 runs in the first inning of game 1 and 8 in the first 2 innings of game 2. “We don’t hope we can win. We expect to win. We know we can win. It is a matter of handling the trip and executing our style of baseball.” Ruston will face Zachary at Zachary Youth Park with games scheduled for: GAME 1: Thursday, April 23rd at 6:30 PM GAME 2: Friday, April 24th at 6:30 PM GAME 3: Saturday, April 25th at Noon ...