Farmington broke open a close contest with a nine-run seventh inning to hand West Prairie/Southeastern a 14-2 Prairieland Conference defeat Saturday in Colchester.
The Farmers sent 14 batters to the plate against a trio of Cyclones’ hurlers to seal the win and improve to 13-4 overall and 4-0 in the conference.
Farmington grabbed a 2-0 lead with a two-out rally in the first against WP/SE starter Tyson Carnes.
Landon Crawford drew a leadoff walk and stole second before Carnes struck out Tristan Handy and retired Jonah Welker on a flyball to center for the second out.
But Bronson Atchley drilled a two-run homer over the left field fence to give the visitors the lead.
The Cyclones would answer in the bottom of the inning with a two-out rally of their own off of Hendy who got the start for Farmington.
After Hendy struck out Mason Whitman to lead off and got Braden Coplen on a flyball to left, Matt Whitman belted a home run to make it 2-1.
Case Marlow followed with a double and Austin Nelson drew a walk, but Hendy struck out Ivan Beck to escape further damage.
The score remained that way until the fourth when Bradyn Brewer singled with one out and eventually came around to score on a base hit by Braelan Krusa to give the Farmers a 3-1 lead.
Boston Smith doubled to put runners on second and third with two outs when Crawford laced a single to drive in two runs and extend the Farmington lead to 5-1.
WP/SE would cut into the lead in the bottom of the fifth against Welker who came in to relieve Hendy.
Matt Whitman greeted the reliever with a double and promptly stole third. After Marlow walked, Welker uncorked a wild pitch to allow Whitman to score to make it 5-2 and send Marlow to second.
Welker got out of the jam by getting Nelson to pop out to third to retire the side.
Carnes had retired six in a row before getting into trouble in the seventh.
Hendy reached on a one-out single and Welker followed with a double to put runners on second and third. Marlow came in to relieve Carnes, but Atchley smashed his second home run of the game, this time a three-run blast, to give Farmington an 8-2 lead.
Five of the next six batters reached for the Farmers which included a two-run single by Smith as the visitors increased their lead to 11-2.
Eli DeCounter came on to relieve Marlow and should have gotten out of the inning but an infield error loaded the bases. Welker followed with a two-run single and Atchley drove in his sixth run of the contest with a base hit to make it 14-2.
The Cyclones went down in order in the bottom of the seventh to drop their season record to 5-9-1 and 1-4 in the Prairieland.
Carnes took the loss after going 6.1 innings, allowing seven runs on eight hits while striking out five and walking only one. Hendy got the win as WP/SE managed only six hits in the game.
Matt Whitman led the Cyclones by going 3-for-3 with a home run and two runs scored.
Atchley paced the Farmington attack going 3-for-4 with a hit-by-pitch, two home runs and six RBIs.
“Tyson Carnes threw an incredible game. He was fantastic,” said WP/SE head coach Grant Bland of his freshman hurler. “We just couldn’t get that third out and that last inning, we just fell apart. They were hitting the ball all over the place and then too many walks in that half inning and that changed it.”
WP/SE kicks off a busy week as the Cyclones were scheduled to travel to Peoria Heights (3-11, 0-3 Prairieland) on Monday for a Prairieland Conference matchup against the Patriots before returning home on Tuesday to face non-conference foe Beardstown in Augusta.
