The West Central 14U baseball team entered the Region 4A championship game as the undefeated team on Wednesday, July 12th. They did battle against Tri-Valley Maroon. Tri-Valley defeated West Central in the first game, forcing a second game. The second game went into extra innings, but West Central prevailed to advance to the state tournament.
Tri-Valley Maroon 5, West Central 3
Tri-Valley put two runs on the board right away in the top of the first inning. West Central got a run in the bottom of the first and then tied the game, 2-2, with a run in the second. Tri-Valley then scored two more times in the top of the third and added another one in the fourth. West Central only scored one more time in the bottom of the sixth.
Ashton Gebhard had a double and an RBI. Langdon Klinkhammer and Taten VanOverbeke each had a hit and an RBI. Hayes Cain and Karson Vessells both finished with a single. Klinkhammer pitched five innings and allowed three runs, one earned, on three hits and a walk with eight strikeouts. Alex Siemonsma pitched two innings and allowed two unearned runs on two walks with one strikeout.
West Central 13, Tri-Valley Maroon 9
Tri-Valley carried the momentum into the second game and scored the first two runs in the bottom of the first inning. West Central had a five-run top of the third. Tri-Valley got another run in the bottom of the inning. After three innings, West Central led 5-3.
West Central then added to their lead with two runs in the top of the fifth. Tri-Valley started their comeback in the bottom of the sixth. They scored three times to make the score 7-6. Tri-Valley then scored another run in the bottom of the seventh to tie the game 7-7 and force extra innings. West Central would outscore Tri-Valley 6-2 in extra innings to get the win.
