On Saturday, the father will take on the son, when Gray Collegiate battles Cardinal Newman in high school baseball

“It will be a great venue and opportunity for both programs and the kids,” said Charles Assey Jr.. He is the head baseball coach at Cardinal Newman. His father is Charlie Assey, the head coach at Gray Collegiate. The game is at 2 p.m. Saturday, at Lexington County Blowfish Stadium. As of Tuesday, Cardinal Newman was 13-2 overall and 4-0 in SCISA 3A Region I and Gray was 10-4 overall and 2-0 in 2A Region III. Cardinal Newman is ranked No. 1, and Gray is ranked No. 8 in the S.C. Baseball Coaches poll released Monday.

“It will be intense, but it’ll be a lot of fun, too,” said Charles Sr. He said he coached much of the staff on his son’s team, and “there will be a lot of ribbing each other, too.”

GAME UPDATE: Gray Collegiate trailed 4-0 heading into the final inning, but the War Eagles scored 4 runs in the inning to tie the game and force extra innings, where Cardinal Newman eventually got the 5-4 win.

I hope we have a good turnout from fans to ensure a great atmosphere,” said the younger Assey. “I hope it will be a good game and well played on both sides. It should be fun. Dad has his guys getting better each week and as the season progresses so Gray is playing well. I’m just excited and thankful to Mr. (Blowfish Bill Shanahan and the Blowfish for giving us an opportunity to display our kids and programs in this platform.”

The elder Assey was named Gray’s head baseball coach in June. He has been a financial planner for MassMutual for close to 20 years, but head coaching again is a “bucket list” item. Before coming back, Charlie Assey Sr. won a state championship at Brookland-Cayce High School in 1998 on a team that included his son. And the father made sure the son did not fall too far from the tree. He was always around to help Charles Jr. And the son won a the 3A SCISA Championship with Cardinal Newman last year.

Charles Sr. spent the last six years helping his son with his programs at White Knoll and Cardinal Newman. But Charlie wanted to get a team of his own. “I got tired of (Charles) telling me what to do,” said Charlie, with a laugh.  “And I’ve just have always wanted to be a head coach again.”

Charles Jr. was named Cardinal Newman’s head baseball coach in 2017 after four seasons as the head coach at White Knoll High School. Prior to his time at White Knoll, Assey Jr. was a head coach at Brookland-Cayce High School and Woodland High School.

“When I took the job two years ago, I wanted to make sure we displayed our players and program with the best around,” Charles Jr. said. He said he wanted to incorporate his personal relationships with the coaches and transfer that to his players so they would compete and the program would gain respect in the SCISA and SCHSL communities.