The Whiteville Post 137 American Legion baseball team is off to a sputtering start.

Since opening their season two weeks ago, the team is carrying a 3-7 record, including a 1-4 mark in Area 2-West League play. Nine league games remain and the Whiteville team needs to finish in the league’s top four to advance to the playoffs.

While things may not look especially promising at this point, Coach Brett Harwood is nowhere near ready to push the panic button. Post 137 has traditionally had one of the most stable programs in Area 2 and it has been rare when the team has failed to make the playoffs during the past 30 years.

“I think we’ll be okay,” said Harwood, following the team’s 12-7 road loss to Stedman Monday. “It’s not that we’re playing that bad, we’re just not putting together nine good innings. We’ve lost a lot of close games and have had opportunities to win just about every game we have been in so far. If we keep working, we’ll come out all right.”

HARWOOD, NOW IN HIS fourth season as Whiteville Legion coach, stressed the point that Post 137 draws players from several programs, both high school and college. Combining the best players from the area has always been a plus for the Post 137 program, but sometimes it can be difficult to get all the pieces to initially fall into place.

“We have had more games than practices,” he said. “We’ve now reached a break in our schedule where we can put in a few good days of practice and have everybody get more used to playing with everybody else. That transition often takes a little time.”

This year’s Post 137 team includes four members who played their first season of college baseball this past spring. These include former Whiteville High outfielder Marquis Smith, now at Shaw University; former WHS pitcher Corey Blackwell, now a Louisburg College; former West Columbus High pitcher Chris Russell, now at Pfeiffer University and former East Columbus High catcher Dustin Proctor, now at Methodist College.

THE TEAM ALSO INCLUDES Whiteville High’s Robbie Penny, Lloyd Enzor, Quan Gaddy and Ben Deans; South Columbus High’s Justin Creech, Charlie Gore and Donovan Watts; East Columbus High’s Caleb Andrews and Waccamaw Academy’s Dustin Williamson.

Daniel Britt, Ryan McCleney, DeMichael Smith and John David White of the West Columbus’ state 1A finalist team joined the Legion team this week.

Jordan McPherson, a 2005 SCHS graduate, and former West Brunswick High catcher Addison Miller are also on the team.

Post 137’s next game will be Sunday when it travels to Wilmington to play Pleasure Island in a 5:30 p.m., game at Hoggard High’s Corbin Field. The next home game will be Monday night at 7 when it plays host to Union Pines.

Since the 1980 season, the Whiteville Post 137 American Legion team has rolled up 531 victories with 285 losses, including state championships in 1985, 1989 and 1996, and state runnerup finishes in 1986, 1990 and 1991. More recently, Post 137 advanced to state tournament play in 2000, 2002 and 2003.