Conway Christian School made it back-to-back state championships with a pair of double-digit victories in state tournament action this past weekend in Surfside Beach.

The Eagles posted a 20-10 win over Maranatha in Friday night's semi-finals and won the state crown with an 18-8 victory over Calvary, Saturday afternoon. A three-run homerun by Chuck Frost ended Saturday's game and short-circuited a Calvary rally that saw Bob Grooms' Patriots cut an early 12-2 deficit to 12-8 in the top of the fifth.

Coach Jennings Duncan's troops scored 10 runs in the fifth inning to break a 10-10 tie and close out Friday night's game, and erupted for six runs in the bottom of the fifth to end Saturday's game on the 10-run rule.

According to assistant coach Corky Connor, the Conway bats came alive in the state tournament with players at the bottom of the line-up hitting the ball better than they had all season.

The title capped a banner season for Conway, which lost six senior starters from this past year's talented state championship team that was rarely tested.

"These guys played together all year and they never gave up," Connor said. "It didn't matter what the score was, they never quit. They battled to the end. They came from behind to win several games. Last year's team never had to do that. They were always ahead. These boys took the challenge and did a fantastic job."

The Eagles posted a huge win on the road at Northside of Charleston late in the regular season to clinch the Coastal 2A Conference title with an 8-1 record when a loss would have forged a three-way tie atop the conference standings.

Conway ended the campaign with an 11-5 record, including several respectable losses to public schools in the annual Hawaiian Tropic Classic. One of the losses was a 3-1 setback to Loris, which won several state AA playoff games.

"They proved to me it's not the size of the school, it's the heart and these guys had heart," Connor said. "It didn't matter who it was, they wanted to play. If I had scheduled the Myrtle Beach Pelicans, they might have been scared, but they would have lined up to play."

Conway received plenty of leadership from Frost, Will Duncan and Seth Johnson, the only seniors on the roster. Johnson did a good job behind the plate while Frost teamed with Duncan and junior Kirk Hardwick to give the Eagles a formidable mound corps.

"Chuck never pitched until this year but he did a good job for us," Connor said. "He pitched some tremendous games and won some big games. He was one of those guys who could play wherever we needed him. We also had a lot of young guys step up and do some major things for us."

Hardwick played first when he wasn't on the mound, Duncan played shortstop and Frost could play second or third. Dalton Jones played shortstop when Duncan was on the mound and George Henry Martin manned first. The outfield starters were Jonathan Walton in left, Michael Sloan in center and Joseph Todd in right. Also contributing to the team's success were John Perry, Bradley Cooper, David Dunn and Jordan Kuykendall.

Also assisting with the coaching duties were Doug Rickert and Dean Connor.