Game 1 - Pioneers 8... Prairie Baseball Academy 6
The MCC Pioneers rallied from a 4-0 1st inning deficit coming up with 4 runs in the 2nd inning and 3 more in the 3rd to edge Prairie Baseball Academy in the home opener for MCC.
DH Ryota Kusumoto (Australia) came up big with 2 doubles and 3 RBI to lead the Pioneers to the win. After giving up 4 runs in the top of the 1st inning, 1B Kaleb Breeze (West Valley City, UT) singled to lead off the bottom of the 2nd. 2B Tyler Tenney (Helena, MT) was hit by a pitch before LF Grant Gabbert singled on a bunt to load the bases. With one out, Kusumoto drilled a line drive double to centerfield bringing in Breeze and Tenney. SS Jaeden Jordahl was hit by a pitch to load the bases again. Gabbert scored on a wild pitch and Kusumoto scored on a dropped 3rd strike to CF Jake Lacey (Gillette, WY) to tie the game at 4-4.
PBA tacked on a run in the top of the 3rd to lead 5-4 and the Pioneers took advantage of more wild pitching by PBA in bottom of inning. Breeze and Tenney were both hit by pitches. Gabbert grounded out to shortstop moving the runners to 2nd and 3rd. Miles City native Clay Prell came up big in a pinch hitting role with a single to right scoring both Breeze and Tenney to make it 6-5 MCC. Kusumoto smacked his 2nd double of the game scoring Prell for a 7-5 lead. PBA scored in the top of 5th and the Pioneers answered with an insurance run in bottom of the 6th. Jordahl started the inning off with a single and Lacey followed that with a single to centerfield. An error in the outfield plated Jordahl for the final run of the game.
Each team recorded 9 hits in the game and each team had one error. PBA pitchers hit 5 Pioneer batters in the game.
Cy Miller (Helena, MT) got the start and lasted only 0.2 innings. He gave up 4 runs on 2 hits, walking one, and hit 3 batters. He struck out one. Patrick Dietz gave a solid 4.1 innings allowing 2 runs on 7 hits. He also recorded 4 strikeouts. Noah Aliff (Centralia, WA) and Jeremy Gee (Brigham City, UT) each threw perfect innings to close out the game. Aliff had a strikeout.
Game 2 - Pioneers 6... Prairie Baseball Academy 3
Kaleb Breeze belted a walk-off game winning 3-run homer to leftfield to carry the Pioneers to a dramatic 6-3 win in game 2 over Prairie Baseball. The Pioneers had only 4 hits in the game, none bigger than Breeze's blast as the Pioneers tallied 4 runs in the 7th after trailing 3-2.
The Pioneers scored a run in the 1st and 3rd, both without a hit. Jaeden Jordahl walked and scored on a sacrifice fly by Jake Lacey. PBA took a 2-1 lead in 2nd and Pioneers scored another in the 3rd in the same fashion as the 1st inning. PBA took a 3-2 lead in the 5th inning and it stayed that way until the hectic 7th.
Grant Gabbert doubled to centerfield to lead of the inning. Then with 2 outs, Gabbert got to 3rd on a passed ball and Lacey singled on a ball to the pitcher scoring the tying run. 3B Tim Holyk (Nanaimo, BC) walked and Breeze took a 2-2 pitch out of the yard for the game winner. Lacey had 2 of the 4 Pioneer hits and 3 RBI to go with the Breeze 3 RBI.
Caeden Riley (Torrington, WY) pitched the first 4 innings in solid fashion. The gave up 2 runs on 4 hits, walking 3 and striking out one. Mason Flanary (Rexburg, ID) went 1.1 innings and walked 2, struck out one, and gave up 2 walks. Jay Neugebauer (Rapid City, SD) went 0.2 innings walking one. Noah Aliff finished the last inning and struck out one.
The two teams will start again at 12:00 PM tomorrow for another doubleheader.