CAIRO — For the second time in school history, the Cairo Syrupmakers can call themselves baseball region champions.

With 7-0 and 10-1 victories over Shaw in the Region 1-4A playoffs on Thursday, Cairo became the top team in its region for the first time since 2008, completing a regular season that started with uncertainty and ended with success under senior leadership.

Cairo won the top seed in its subregion and just needed to win a series against the No. 4 seeded Raiders to beat out Columbus, the No. 1 team in the other division. For the first game of Thursday’s doubleheader, the Syrupmakers took a chance on a young arm coming off a shaky outing against a tough non-region opponent.

Blake Touchton, a freshman, gave up three runs and four walks in a three-inning start against Bainbridge last week. That didn’t stop Cairo from starting him in a critical first game of the region playoffs.

The move paid off, with Touchton allowing no runs and no hits over six innings against Shaw, striking out five — part of a combined no-hitter with John Michael Owens.

“I didn’t throw him against anybody in the region,” Cairo assistant head coach Chris Wheaton said. “I knew that they could swing the bat pretty well and I wanted to have somebody that nobody has seen just to give us a little bit of an edge over them.”

The first win cleared the way for Cairo’s ace to lock down the championship. Senior Emerson Hancock continued to do what he has done all year, allowing three hits and one run, striking out 13 in Game 2.

Cairo was also very productive at the plate with 14 combined hits. Seniors like Owens, Seth Hurst, and Drew Leverette and Austin Shattles led the way.

With the coaching shakeup that occurred right before the season began, getting some of that leadership from its seniors on and off the field was a must.

“Having seven seniors really kind of helps set the tone with everybody else,” Wheaton said. “We had a lot of returning players and they had a bad taste in their mouths after last year. We felt like we should have won it last year.”

“They kind of had a little bit of added focus to come out this season and take care of business.”

The Syrupmakers will host their first game of the state playoffs next week at Jackie Robinson Field.