The West Central 14U baseball team is headed to the South Dakota VFW 14U State A baseball tournament after winning the Region 4A tournament held in Parker Monday, July 11th through Wednesday, July 13th.
West Central 16, Tri-Valley White 1
In the opening game of the tournament on Monday, West Central cruised to a 16-1 over Tri-Valley. They scored four runs in the bottom of the first, one in the second, nine in the third, and two in the fourth. West Central pitchers held Tri-Valley to just three hits in the game.
CJ DenBoer had two hits, one a triple, and three RBIs. Nick Lorang had two hits and an RBI. Anthony Lanham also had two hits, one a triple. Alex Siemonsma finished with a hit and three RBIs. Hayes Cain had a single and two RBIs. Jack Sebert finished with a single. Dylan Bettcher and Taten VanOverbeke both had an RBI.
Lanham pitched two innings and allowed one hit and struck out four. DenBoer pitched an inning and allowed a hit and two walks with two strikeouts. Ashton Gebhard pitched one inning and allowed an earned run on a hit and two walks with a strikeout.
West Central 10, Parker 5
West Central earned a spot in the championship game after a 10-5 win over Parker on Tuesday. Lanham had an RBI sacrifice fly, and Lorang added an RBI single in the top of the first inning to give West Central an early 2-0 lead. They added three more in the top of the second. Cain had an RBI double, and Lanham brought home two more with a single.
Parker cut the lead to 5-2 with two runs in the bottom of the second. West Central, however, put the pressure on Parker with a five-run fifth inning. Lanham scored on an error. DenBoer scored on a wild pitch, Siemonsma had an RBI single and then scored on a wild pitch, and Cain had an RBI single. Parker added two more runs in the fifth and one in the sixth.
Lanham had two hits and three RBIs. Cain had two hits, one a double, and two RBIs. Lorang finished with two hits and an RBI. Siemonsma added a single and an RBI. DenBoer and Jacob Kono each had a single. Lanham pitched five innings and allowed four runs, one earned, on three hits and two walks with seven strikeouts. Sebert pitched two innings and allowed an unearned run on three hits and had two strikeouts.
West Central 9, Madison Black 7
West Central scored early and never trailed while holding off Madison late in the game on Wednesday. The 9-7 victory gave West Central the Region 4A title and a spot in the state tournament.
Sebert and DenBoer scored on errors in the bottom of the second for a 2-1 lead. After Madison scored one run in the top of the second, West Central added two more in the bottom of the inning. Connor Mebius scored on an error, and Lorang was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to make the score 4-1.
Madison cut the lead to 4-3 with two runs in the top of the third, but West Central answered right back. Kono scored on an error, and Lorang had a two-run single to push the lead to 7-3. Mebius had an RBI single in the bottom of the fourth, and Lorang added an RBI single in the bottom of the fifth to make the score 9-3. Madison scored four times in the top of the sixth, but the rally was stopped there.
Lorang had three hits and four RBIs. Mebius had a hit and an RBI. VanOeverbeke added a single. Sebert pitched 5 1/3 innings and allowed seven runs, five earned, on nine hits and a walk with three strikeouts. DenBoer pitched the final 1 2/3 innings and allowed three hits and a walk with four strikeouts.