EMPORIA — An optimist could say Iola High’s baseball team is capable of playing with Class 5A schools like Emporia, despite a litany of mistakes that forced the Mustangs to settle for a doubleheader split Friday.
“The other side of me as a coach says, ‘Hey, let’s not make so many mistakes,’” Mustang head coach Levi Ashmore said.
Ashmore counted up eight Mustang miscues, either fielding errors, missed bunts or similar setbacks, in the second game of Iola’s doubleheader at Emporia.
“If any of those things had gone our way, it could have been a different result,” Ashmore said.
Instead, Emporia scored in walk-off fashion in the bottom of the eighth inning to win, 5-4, on Chase Harrington’s RBI double.
The loss came after Iola rallied to win Game 1, 9-8, and then rallied again to erase what had been a 4-0 Emporia lead in Game 2.
“It was kind of a roller-coaster,” Ashmore said.
Jase Herrmann’s RBI single started Iola’s comeback Game 2 in the top of the fifth inning against Emporia starter Owen Ruge.
The Mustangs found their offense in the sixth. Landon Weide started things with a double, followed by singles from Korbin Cloud, Tre Wilson and Grady Dougherty before Mac Leonard’s sacrifice fly evened the score at 4-4.
Meanwhile, Leonard handled the pitching duties. Even after a tough start that saw Emporia score three times in the bottom of the third to lead 4-0, Leonard cruised through the middle innings.
But Ashmore pointed to a missed bunt for Iola with runners on first and second and nobody out in the top of the eighth as a critical turning point. Instead, a pop-out and double play ended the threat without scoring. In addition, Iola let a pop-up drop late during the Spartans’ winning rally, “and we had a couple of costly baserunning errors,” he said. “That’s baseball. You can’t get those plays back.”
A single and a hit batter set the table for Harrington’s game winner.
Wilson led the offense with a single, double and triple in four at-bats. Weide added a double. Cloud, Dougherty, Leonard and Herrmann had singles.
Leonard pitched all the way for Iola, allowing seven hits over seven innings with three strikeouts.
THE FIRST game also was a back-and-forth affair.
