Burnside Wins Final District Title Of Career Over Rival

It has been a long and illustrious career for South Dade Manager Fred Burnside, who is retiring at the end of this season. The skipper, who will manage the public school team in this year’s HSBN Broward vs. Miami Senior All-Star Game, and will also be honored at the game during the Legends of the Dugout Ceremony at the game, made one final district stand on Thursday night.

His Buccaneers have been a frontrunner in the district for much of the year, and faced a familiar foe in the district title game. Palmetto, managed by one of Burnside’s former players, Danny Smith, stood in the way of Burnside getting his last district title.

The South Dade players, however, were not going to let their manager go out without the storybook ending.

The Bucs rode the arm of junior Brandon Roman, who threw 5.1 innings of four-hit ball, and had a couple timely hits to capture the 7A-16 title 3-1 over the Panthers.

“It was a great game,” said Burnside. “I am so proud of our guys, and Palmetto and Danny Smith are always a class act.”

Sophomore Luis Sosa matched Roman for most of the night, but the Bucs were able to break through in the third with two runs.

The score then remained 2-0 into the fourth, when Jack Gordon led off with a double. After a groundout advanced Gordon to third, Mike Arnold hit a sacrifice fly to cut the lead to 2-1.

The score would stay that way until the bottom of the sixth, when Jose Ruiz-Galvez doubled in an insurance run for South Dade.

From there, Kaleb Borek closed the door, and sent the Bucs to their first district title since 2017.

Next up for South Dade will be regional play next week.

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