After the Iola A Indians fell in the final inning of a heartbreaking loss to El Dorado Post 81 in the opener, the Indians stormed back and won the second game of the evening by one run.
The Indians (4-2) found themselves trailing in the seventh inning of game one after El Dorado scored three runs to go ahead, 6-5. Iola had led throughout the ballgame after scoring four runs across the first two innings for the early 4-3 lead.
Iola did enough in game two to take down El Dorado with a big sixth inning where each scored six runs, leaving the Indians ahead 7-6. The Indians’ pitching proved to be enough through the final few innings as Gavin Jones closed it out for the save.
Game one
Iola jumped ahead in the first two innings followed by a dry spell until the fifth inning. El Dorado pushed three runs across in the second inning before they scratched three more across for the win in the seventh.
“When the floodgates open, we open them, so when we make a mistake we’ve got to let it go and make the next play,” Iola head coach Jason Bauer said. “Sometimes we don’t make plays in the field and carry it with us to the batter’s box and have a terrible at bat.”
“It’s just part of maturity,” Bauer said.
Kyler Isbell sent a sacrifice fly to left field that scored Nick Bauer and made it 1-0 in the bottom of the first. Kade Nilges then doubled to left field to bring home Isbell for the 2-0 advantage heading to the second.
El Dorado cut into Iola’s lead in the second when Xavier Cortez walked with the bases loaded to make it 2-1. Abe Pena then grounded out into a fielder’s choice to shortstop which brought home one run and knotted the game at 2-2.
Two batters later, Tanner Riddle singled to right field to plate one more run for El Dorado’s 3-2 lead.
In the bottom of the second, Jacob Harrington singled to center to plate two runs and go back ahead, 4-3. Bauer then scored on a wild pitch in the fifth and gave Iola a 5-3 lead.
Cortez doubled to right field to plate another run and bring El Dorado back within one, 5-4. Blake Hightower shot a sac fly to center which plated another run to knot the game at 5-5.
In the seventh, Riddle sent a sacrifice fly out to left that plated a run for the final 6-5 score in El Dorado’s favor.
“We didn’t play badly, we’ve just got to close out one-run games,” said Bauer. “You’d like to see a clean game and hopefully that comes with time. We didn’t hit the ball that hard. We’re not to a point where we feel comfortable driving the ball the other way.”
Isbell started on the mound and worked 2.2 innings, allowing three runs on three hits with four strikeouts. Nilges threw the final 4.1 frames and allowed only three runs on three hits with two strikeouts.
