If youve been following Iola High School baseball this season, youve seen that this years group has been just as dominant as last years state championship team.
The Mustangs have had little trouble beating just about everyone theyve come in contact with on their way to a 12-0 record, making them one of five undefeated teams left in the state of Kansas along with Bishop Carroll, Atchison-Maur Hill-Mount Academy, Frontenac and Elkhart.
However, whats been most notable about this season is who they havent found a way to beat yet Mother Nature.
Now its been an especially rainy spring all around the state so cancellations and reschedulings are something every school has had to battle at least once this year. But Iola has had particularly bad luck trying to play out their 20-game season.
Their series versus Chanute was rescheduled twice including turning what was supposed to be a home series for Iola into a home-and-road split between baseball and softball. That day, the rain got to Iola right before first pitch, canceling the series for the Fillies. By the time the rain got to Chanute, the Mustangs were up 10-0 in the top of the fourth with two on and no one out.
The game was then suspended and eventually canceled due to a lack of umpires. Softball at least got their chance to finish the Chanute series last Friday in Humboldt.
The Parsons series was also rescheduled twice but it ended up getting canned because there wasnt enough time in the season for the teams to wrap up their league slate and play a non-conference game before regionals start next Monday.
Iola was supposed to play at Santa Fe Trail on Tuesday, but once again, bad weather and time constraints canceled it after it was already postponed once before.
Which leaves todays game scheduled for 11:30 a.m. at the Humboldt Sports Complex, when Iola faces Wellsville with their second straight Pioneer League title on the line. A split gives the Mustangs a share of the league and an Iola sweep will once again give them the crowns.
Why Humboldt? Because they have an artificial turf field thats managed to avoid the damage that this past week of rain has inflicted on both Iola and Wellsvilles home fields.
Why 11:30? Because the Cubs, who ended the regular season on Monday at 17-3 and head into regionals as the three-seed in a loaded region, still have to practice this afternoon.
As for regional seeding, todays games do not matter. The seeds were released on Tuesday and Iola is top of the heap in 4A and will host the entire region minus the play-in game and will take on the winner of Bishop Miege and Coffeyville-Field Kindley.
Miege is probably the odds-on favorite for the Mustangs to face considering they play one of the toughest schedules in the state for a smaller school. Nearly all of their games this season have been against 5A or 6A schools so the fact that theyve won just four of them (including their two games versus 4A schools) doesnt quite represent what they might be when they show up in Iola on Tuesday.
But the players and coaches for Iola really dont care whether they play Bishop Miege, Wellsville or Chanute.
They just want to play.
