MARYSVILLE — Good things come to those who wait. The Post 15 Iola Indians should know.
They waited a full 24 hours through rain and muddy field conditions at Feldhausen Field in Marysville to finally get to the first game of the American Legion AA State Tournament on Thursday.
But when they got there they started will a bang, beating Russell 6-5.
“I think for the boys, after the experience they got last year and this year at the high school state tournament, they were bound and determined to not come out here and lose two games,” head coach Rick Vink said. “The way it’s setting up for us, I think we can be here until Sunday. That’s our goal. Getting to state every year isn’t something that’s automatic so that’s something you have to take advantage of.”
Russell was no slouch either. They came into Thursday’s game as one of the top teams in the tournament and winners of their last 17 games.
“I told our boys, ‘They think they’re better than us. They think they’re going to come right out and beat us,’” Vink said. “But I also said, ‘If we stick with them and get a lead we can win.’ I knew we were going to need five or six runs and we needed every bit of the six we scored.”
The win was never safe. Russell jumped out to an early 3-1 lead after three innings and had the go-ahead run at the plate in the top of the seventh with two outs.
In the first two innings the Indians left four men on base and seemed doomed to repeat themselves again in the bottom of the third. This time though Cal Leonard doubled home Daylon Splane and Blake Ashmore to tie it up at 3-all. Ashmore was the leader in hits with three.
A walk loaded the bases allowing Ben Cooper to single into the shallow right field, scoring two more to complete a four-run and give Iola its first lead of the game.
Meanwhile, starter Daylon Splane was finding his rhythm. After a rough first inning, giving up three straight hits and two runs to start the ball game, Splane struck out three in a row to close out the inning and regain his composure.
“It felt good,” Splane said. “My arm is actually feeling good. I got off to a slow start when they started to hit the ball but I mixed it up and they slowed down.”
Splane went the distance, throwing 110 pitches over seven innings, giving up five runs on 13 hits and recording 10 strikeouts.
A Russell error in the bottom of the sixth allowed Iola to add an insurance run, pushing the Indian lead to three. Iola committed only one error in the ballgame.
Russell’s bats got going again in the top of the seventh as a single and Splane’s first walk of the game put two on the basepaths with one out. After Splane recorded his final strikeout of the game for out number two, a single up the middle to center field scored the two Russell runners, cutting the Indians’ lead down to one.
Then it looked as if Splane might not finish out the game as he opened up the next at-bat with three straight balls.
“You can’t take the kid out of the game if you wanted to,” Vink said. “But what he doesn’t know is that on that 3-0 count on that last batter I said, ‘If (Splane) walks him, we have to go get him.’ But then he threw a strike and got him to ground into third base to end the game.”
