COLCHESTER – Bushnell- Prairie City jumped out to a 4-2 lead after three innings before West Prairie erupted for 11 runs over the next two innings and the Cyclones went on to a 13-5 victory over the Spartans in a Class 1A baseball regional opener at Friendway Park.
B-PC saw its season come to an end with a 1-32 record.
The Spartans took an early 1-0 lead in the first inning when Connor Palm led off with a single and Dylan King followed with a walk from West Prairie starter Matt Whitman.
Both players advanced after Whitman was called for a balk and Palm eventually came in on a wild pitch.
The Cyclones would tie the score at 1-1 in the bottom half of the inning after Whitman drilled a oneout triple and came home on an RBI groundout by Austin Nelson.
B-PC capitalized on a pair of lead off walks and another balk from Whitman to retake the lead in the top of the second.
A wild pitch put runners on second and third and with two outs, Palm laced a single to drive in two runs, giving the Spartans a 3-1 lead.
West Prairie mounted another threat in the bottom of the second when Palm, who started on the mound for the Spartans, gave up a two-out RBI hit to Braden Coplan to bring the Cyclones to within 3-2.
Coplan, who came on in relief of Whitman who was pulled in the second due to pitch count, walked Talan Love with two out.
Love stole second but an errant throw from Nelson behind the plate allowed Love to go to third. Then, the relay throw got past third baseman Jace Brown, allowing Love to score, giving B-PC a 4-2 advantage.
That’s how the score would stay until the bottom of the fourth when West Prairie sent nine batters to the plate and scored five runs to go on top 7-4.
The Cyclones got seven hits during the outburst including a three-run home run from Brody Cordell.
B-PC would threaten in the fifth when Thomas Anderson and Love led off with consecutive singles. But Coplan struck out the next three hitters to escape the jam.
The Cyclones put the game out of reach by sending 12 batters to the plate in the fifth, scoring six times to extend their lead to 13-4.
Eli DeCounter and Brown each had two-run doubles to pace the attack.
The Spartans got on the scoreboard again in the seventh when King led off with a single and Love launched an RBI-triple down the right field line to make it 13-5 before Coplan retired the next two B-PC hitters to end the game.
Coplan earned the victory in relief after allowing only two runs on five hits and striking out 11 in 5-2/3 innings.
Whitman led the Cyclones’ offense by going 4-for-4 with two RBIs while Cordell went 2-for-5 with a home run and four runs batted in.
DeCounter and Brown also drove in two runs apiece for West Prairie who’s record improved to 5-15 overall.
Love paced B-PC by going 2-for-3 with an RBI and a run scored while Palm went 2-for-3 with two runs batted in and a run scored.
Despite the season-ending loss, B-PC head coach Dave Arnold found a lot of positives by his team’s overall performance.
“These kids were pumped up all day,” said Arnold, who has 10 underclassmen returning next year. “Usually if you have a team that hasn’t won all year, they just want to get it over with. But, not these guys. They were ready to go and excited and thought they could compete with West Prairie even though they had Matt Whitman on the mound.”
“For the season we’ve had, they’ve played hard every day. They pretty much give you everything they’ve got,” he added.
West Prairie head coach Grant Bland wasn’t as pleased with his team’s start, but was happy to see how they finished.
“We talked about how it was a slow start for us,” said Bland. “The game plan was to come out hot, but it doesn’t happen sometimes. Luckily, our guys responded well and played through the adversity. Jace Brown had a huge day at the plate and Brody Cordell with the momentum-shifting home run was everything right there…That was awesome.”
Bland also had words of praise for Coplan coming on in relief of Whitman early on.
“He came in and did exactly what we wanted him to do,” said Bland. “That was kind of our game plan the whole time to let Matt get a couple of innings with a pitch count and be good to go Wednesday. Braden executed exactly what we wanted from him.”
“I’m very proud of how he handled himself there,” he added.
