After jumping on top in the opening inning, the Iola A Indians weren’t able to overcome some poor defense later on and only had three hits in a nine inning 13-6 loss to Fort Scott’s E3 Freedom.
A couple of costly innings hurt the Indians (13-7) in the third and seventh innings when the Freedom scored three runs in each. Fort Scott then poured on five runs in the seventh to put an exclamation mark on a 13-6 loss.
Iola had only three hits all night and walked 10 times.
“We didn’t have energy today. There were plays that we didn’t make that we should have made,” Iola head coach Jason Bauer said. “There were plays where we didn’t help our pitchers. We’ve got to have base runners and we had too many strikeouts.”
Gavin Jones took the loss in relief, throwing the final three innings and allowing eight runs on eight hits with two strikeouts. Grady Dougherty opened the game on the hill and tossed six innings of five-run ball with six hits allowed and seven strikeouts.
Iola got on top early when Ryan Golden and Drake Weir were both walked with the bases loaded for the 2-0 advantage.
But the lead was never safe.
Fort Scott’s Brody Gomez grounded out to second base to bring home a run in the top of the second for the 2-1 score.
In the top of the third, Fort Scott’s Kanin Brown scored on a passed ball to knot the game at 2-2. Gomez then tripled to right field to plate two more runs and sink the Indians into a 4-2 deficit.
Iola’s Blake Ellis took home on a passed ball to make it a 4-3 game in the third. Cole Mathes then doubled to left field to bring home Easton Weseloh and knot the game at 4-4 in the fourth.
Lenoxx Vann scored on a wild pitch to put Fort Scott ahead 5-4 in the top of the sixth. Then one inning later Vann delivered again with an RBI double to left field to extend the lead over Iola to 6-4.
“Our outfielders can get better jumps and they need to catch more of those fly balls,” said Bauer. “It’s a learning curve and they don’t all play those positions. We’ve just got to forget this game. It’s good for us to see. We didn’t lay down once the game started.”
Two batters later, Fort Scott’s Brady Messer singled to center field to bring home Lenoxx and Brady for the 8-4 advantage. 
Ellis came up for the Indians again in the bottom of the seventh when he poked an RBI double to right field to score Mathes and make it an 8-5 game.
Fort Scott’s big inning came in the top of the ninth and sealed the deal on a victory. Gomez singled to right field to score two runs and make it 10-5. Two batters later, Ryder Newton doubled to left field to score two more runs and take a 12-5 lead.
