When third-ranked Class 7A Spain Park makes the 7-mile journey to meet fourth-ranked Vestavia Hills on Friday, a baseball state playoff semifinal berth will be on the line. Friendships, and there are a lot of them, likely won’t be.

The two head coaches, Vestavia Hills’ Jamie Harris and Spain Park’s Will Smith, met when they were both assistants for former Vestavia standout Casey Dunn – Harris’ teammate on the Rebels’ squad – at Spain Park. When Smith was hired as Dunn’s replacement, he kept Harris on his first staff.

“We talk a lot during the season,” Smith said. “We have a unique bond and a very transparent bond. A lot of our style is the same. We both try to play the game the correct way. I think our roles as a coach – and he takes the same approach – is very much to be a mentor and teacher. We try to teach life lessons as well as a little bit of baseball.”

That teaching has paid off on the field this season as Spain Park carries a 28-7 record into Friday’s second-round doubleheader that is set for 4:30 and 7 p.m. Vestavia Hills is 28-9. If a third game is necessary, it’s scheduled for Saturday at 1 p.m.

“I think the world of them,” Harris said of the Spain Park staff. “Will is a good friend of mine. Clay Spencer (the Spain Park catcher and son of assistant David) and my son, Jackson, were running around on the field there when they were 4 years old.”

The teams’ rosters feature several players know each other from playing as area foes in the past and some who play together in summer ball. “I am actually friends with a lot of their parents,” Harris said. “Spencer, Evan Smallwood, Cole Edwards and (John Robert) Thompson played with us all summer.

“This is friends taking on friends. I’ve gone to birthday parties with them in the past six months,” Harris said. “It’s fun that way, but also gut-wrenching. When we saw how the playoffs shook out, we knew it could definitely happen. And it has.”

The coaches agreed that the Jaguars and Rebels rely on offenses that are productive from the top of the order through No. 9. The pitching staffs, Smith said, “have guys who throw strikes. They fill up the strike zone and have multiple pitches they can throw for strikes. One arm doesn’t make or break the team or the series. There’s going to be a lot of depth in both bullpens and on both staffs.”

Spain Park will probably send senior Lucas Thornton out to start Game 1 and junior CJ Gross in Game 2. Vestavia will counter with senior Aiden Black in Friday’s first game. “Then, we’ll figure it out from there,” Harris said. “That’s how we’ve been since we started area play.”

Black and fellow seniors Ryan Vermillion and Jable Ramey have been the top three pitchers for the Rebels with senior Barrett Harper and junior Matthew Ledbetter adding quality depth. Vermillion is a Jacksonville State commitment and Ramey is headed to Huntingdon.

Right fielder Christopher Johnston is bound for Auburn. First baseman Harris, who is batting over .400, will play at Samford and catcher Hudson Walburn is headed for Jacksonville State. Walburn has played varsity for the Rebels for four years after being pulled up due to an injury when he was a freshman. Junior infielder John Paul Head, who went 2-for-4 with a homer and double in last week’s first-round Game 3 win, has committed to UAB. Junior designated hitter Mason Perrigo is committed to Duke.

“Offensively, no one guy has been hotter than any other, really,” Harris said. “It seems to be a different guy every game. We have three or four guys who are three-year starters and we kind of knew what we had in them. We also had several other guys returning, too. We’ve got a lot of depth and we’re difficult to pitch to. We could trade our No. 8 hitter with our No. 2 and not see much difference.”

Smith said his offense has seemed to have a different top contributor in different phases of the season. Now, it’s senior third baseman and leadoff hitter Evan Smallwood sparking the team. “He’s one of three guys who has been in at the top of our order pretty much every day since their sophomore year,” he said of the Jax State commitment. “He has the ability to get on base multiple ways. He creates so many things in our offense.”

Auburn commitment Cole Edwards, a 6-foot-4, 190-pound first baseman who delivered a walk-off single in Game 1 of last week’s 6-5 win over James Clemens, holds down the No. 2 spot in the order. Jacob Tobias bats in the No. 3 spot. The senior designated hitter/outfielder, who is going to play for Lipscomb, bats in front of clean-up hitter Spencer.

Smith said the Jags’ No. 5 hitter, junior left fielder Matthew Widra, “down the stretch has been one of our most consistent hitters. Against James Clemens last weekend, he went 2-for-3 in both games and scored four runs.”

The two teams split a pair of games in March, with Vestavia winning 5-0 at home and Spain Park taking a 6-4 win at the Jaguars’ park two days later.

“Without question, I think this week’s winner will be the team that plays the ‘cleanest’ game,” Smith said. “Looking back over the past three of four years when we’ve played, it’s the team that is not only clean defensively, but it matters when the big hit happens. When we played at their place earlier this season, we never got the big two-out hit we needed. When we played them at home, we had three two-out hits that scored four runs.”

Harris said his club is prepared for the pressure of the win-or-go-home aspect of the series. “Certainly, us making a run to the semifinals last year can do nothing but help us,” he said. “We’ve been there before and experienced that feeling in the stomach. They have played in front of 3- or 4,000 people, or whatever it is. That’s not to say that Spain Park won’t handle it well. But they are all kids and, like anything in life, experience is the best teacher.”

Smith led the 2014 Spain Park team to the state championship, the school’s only blue map. Vestavia has won nine championships, the most recent coming in 2000 at the end of a seven-year streak of titles under Sammy Dunn.

This weekend’s Class 7A schedule:

CLASS 7A QUARTERFINALS

Smiths Station (23-14-1) vs. Baker (24-15), Friday, 4 and 6:30 p.m. (Game 3, Saturday, 1 p.m., if necessary)

Central-Phenix City (29-8) at Enterprise (23-12), Friday, 4:30 and 7 p.m. (Game 3, Saturday, noon, if necessary)

Spain Park (28-7) at Vestavia Hills (28-9), Friday, 4:30 and 7 p.m. (Game 3, Saturday, 1 p.m., if necessary)

Thompson (34-5) at Bob Jones (35-10), Friday, 5 and 7:30 p.m. (Game 3, Saturday, 1 p.m., if necessary)