CONCORDIA, Kan. – Battling back from deficits on two separate occasions in both ends of a Sunday doubleheader, the Cloud County Community College baseball team managed to defeat Marshalltown Community College 6-4 before walking off with a 13-12 extra-innings victory in game two at Lee Doyen Field to sweep the first two games of a four-game series at Lee Doyen Field on February 18th.
Improving to 5-2 on the year, Cloud County has now won their past four games after playing their third extra-innings game of the year in seven games this season while Marshalltown opens their 2024 campaign with a pair of losses to fall to 0-2 on the season.
Game One:
Breaking a trend of being unable to win when not scoring first this season, the T-Birds overcame deficits of 1-0 and 4-3 as the offensive damage for CCCC was done in the bottom of the second and bottom of the fifth innings with a pair of three-run innings proving to be enough offense to get through the series opener with a win. The 1-0 deficit for Cloud County came following the top of the second as back-to-back doubles for Marshalltown put the Tigers on the board for the first time on the season with Tyler Greig driving home Sinclair Lee to put MCC up 1-0. It was a short-lived lead for Marshalltown however as Cloud County responded with a leadoff
Noah Konings single to start a three-hit inning with Nolan Fruend getting a one-out single to put two runners aboard before an
Easton Norris walk to load the bases. With the lineup flipped over to the leadoff hitter in
Paul Schuyler, the Bellevue, Nebraska native came through with a two-RBI double down the left field line and was followed by
Gavin Roy getting hit by a pitch and an RBI fielder's choice for
Demitri Shakotko to finish off the three-run inning for the T-Birds.
The score remained 3-1 in favor of CCCC until the top of the fourth when MCC managed to put together their strongest offensive inning of the game with a wild pitch on a strikeout putting a leadoff runner aboard before a double and one-out RBI single to bring the Tigers back within a run at 3-2. A hit batter forced the T-Birds into a pitching change before a sacrifice fly to tie the game with a go-ahead RBI double putting MCC back out in front with a three-run inning coming on three hits despite stranding a go-ahead runner at third with a strikeout ending the inning. This time, it took until the bottom of the fifth for Cloud County to strike back as a pitching change made by the Tigers allowed the T-Birds to take advantage of the MCC bullpen with a
Landon Meyer leadoff single setting up a go-ahead two-run home run for
Jakob Poturnak on a ball that hugged the left field foul pole and snuck just inside for his second home run of the year. Three batters later, it was
Nolan Freund who wanted to get in on the action with a solo homer of his own by trying to match Poturnak down the left field line and keeping a line drive fair by five feet and up over the elevated fence to give CCCC an added run of insurance to go up 6-4 heading into the sixth.
Working around a one-out single by Marshalltown by inducing an inning-ending double play, Cloud County was able to keep the Tigers off the scoreboard the rest of the game despite a seventh-inning rally that saw a leadoff base runner reach on an error and move to third with two outs in the inning as a strikeout by
Carson Latimer ended the game and allowed CCCC to hang on for the two-run victory.
Offensively, Cloud County finished with nine hits with Konings and Freund each recording two hits while Schuyler and Poturnak each finished tied for a game-high two RBI as the T-Birds stranded just five runners in the contest. Pitching was arguably more impressive for CCCC as starter
Tyler Elliot struck out eight in 3.1 innings of work despite giving up four runs on four hits before seeing
Riley Marsh (0.2 innings) and Latimer (3.0 innings) add another five strikeouts in the game to give the T-Birds 13 total strikeouts as a pitching staff with Latimer picking up his first win of the year.
Game Two:
The back end of the doubleheader proved to be anything but typical for a baseball game as Cloud County outhit Marshalltown 17-5 in the game but still needed a late seventh-inning rally to force extra innings before walking things off in the bottom of the eighth to earn a second consecutive come-from-behind victory. Jumping out to a 2-0 lead after an inning of play, CCCC saw MCC respond with two runs of their own in the top of the second as a one-out walk set up a game-tying home run from Chase Clemons as the Tigers eventually took their first lead of the game in the top of the third with a hit batter, single, and flyout putting runners on the corners with one out. Following a wild pitch that allowed the runner at first to take a free 90 feet, Marshalltown's Lee hit an RBI groundout to put MCC in front 3-2 for the time being despite being held to one hit in each of the first three innings.
Reclaiming the lead and momentum in the bottom of the third, Cloud County used a Freund double to lead things off before being forced to put together a two-out rally with a Konings infield single and
TJ Coats hit-by-pitch to load the bases with
Gavin Roy coming to the plate. Battling to a full count after falling behind and eventually drawing an RBI walk, Roy extended the inning with
Kolby Girrens hitting an RBI fielder's choice on a ball that was hit to shortstop and brought home a go-ahead run to put Cloud County up 5-3 before seeing
Austin Coyle and Schuyler both get hit by pitches to bring home two more runs and put the T-Birds up 6-3 heading into the fourth.
Following a one-two-three top of the fourth, Cloud County brought on pinch-hitter
Stryker Hake to lead off the bottom of the inning as the Concordia, Kansas native made a big impact in his collegiate debut by blasting a leadoff home run to right center field and add to the CCCC lead as the T-Birds held a 7-3 lead after four innings of action. Three walks proved costly for the Cloud County pitching staff in the fifth as Marshalltown managed to plate a run and get back within three at 7-4 before seeing the T-Birds respond with a Schuyler two-RBI double to bring home Girrens and Coyle who both reached to lead off the top of the fifth and make things a 9-4 game in favor of CCCC.
Weirdness ensued in the top of the sixth as Cloud County needed three pitchers to get through the inning as Marshalltown drew four straight walks to begin the inning before a two-RBI double from Carter Schellsmidt to bring the Tigers within two at 9-7 with a pair of runners in scoring position and still no outs. Following a hit batter to load the bases, two more walks loaded the bases before a hit batter and sacrifice fly to bring home two more runs for MCC followed by another hit batter and walk as Marshalltown managed to plate eight runs on one hit to turn a five-run deficit into a three-run lead going into the bottom of the sixth.
The deflated feeling of seeing a large lead get completely erased half an inning earlier carried over into the bottom half of the inning for Cloud County as the T-Birds were unable to turn a leadoff single from Konings into any production to send things to the seventh where a one-two-three innings with two strikeouts from reliever
John Klus got some energy back into the CCCC dugout with the need for three runs to potentially extend the game into extra innings. Back-to-back pinch hitters to lead off the bottom of the seventh worked to perfection for Cloud County as Norris and Shakotko both delivered with base hits as Shakotko found the left-center field gap to bring home a run and put the game-tying run at the plate. Following a lineout from Freund and Hake strikeout to put the T-Birds down to their last out, Cloud County got a pinch-hit triple from
Eric Bradicich on a ball that was hit to the deepest part of the park and rolled to the fence in center field as CCCC suddenly found themselves with the game-tying run at third base. Finishing off the rally was Konings with a game-tying single to center field as Bradicich came home to score and knot things at 12-12 with the rally once again bringing momentum into the T-Bird dugout.
Another shutdown inning from Klus on the mound saw Marshalltown retired in order with CCCC starting to sense the possibility of a walk-off win in their third extra-innings game of the year through their first seven games as defensive replacement
Easton Mould hit a leadoff single before seeing
Dawson Feil hit a sacrifice bunt to move the Nanaimo, British Columbia native into scoring position. A groundout from Norris allowed Mould to move to third with a second-out being put on the board to bring up Shakotko as the returning All-NJCAA Region VI selection hit a bouncing ball behind the pitcher and back up the middle to give CCCC the wild walk-off win.
A true team effort that saw 22 different Cloud County players enter the game saw the 17 T-Bird hits come from 11 different players as only Konings was able to finish with more than two hits in the game for CCCC. Seven of the hits for the T-Birds went for extra bases as Cloud County added three walks and four hit-by-pitches while stranding nine base runners in the game and striking out eight times. Marshalltown stranded eight runners of their own after drawing 13 walks and four hit-by-pitches of their own as Schellsmidt accounted for four of the five Tiger hits in the game.
On the mound, Klus earned the win to improve to 1-0 after going the longest out of the six T-Bird pitchers used in the game with four of the eight Cloud County strikeouts coming from the Loveland, Colorado native. In addition to Klus,
Aaron Boutz also did not surrender a run during his two-thirds of an inning outing against four batters he faced.
What's Next?
A 12 PM first pitch is set for Monday as both Cloud County and Marshalltown will meet back up to conclude a four-game series at Lee Doyen Field as CCCC will look for a series victory in game one. Both games on Monday will be seven innings in length as the T-Birds close out an extended six-game week over the past five days before getting two days off from competition.
