SEEING GROWTH: Indians keep improving despite losses in Chanute

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Sports

June 28, 2017 - 12:00 AM

CHANUTE — Post 15 Single-A Indians coach Brian Dillow has been very consistent with his message throughout the season and recently he has seen the wins to back up his goal of consistent improvement and getting his team to peak heading into their zone tournament.
On Tuesday, the Indians did not get those wins as Chanute emerged with 11-3 and 6-5 victories at Katy Park, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t another step toward reaching Dillow’s goals for his team. The Indians were still able to display plenty of growth in the doubleheader.
“We are getting better every game we play, a lot better,” Dillow said. “We’ve seen that over the past couple weeks and I have no issues with where we are at right now.”
One of the most promising performances on Tuesday came from Hunter Baughn, who normally holds down third base for the Indians, but prides himself on being a versatile player and moving all around the diamond — also seeing time and center field and at second base on Tuesday.
Dillow called on Baughn to start game two against Chanute.
Baughn is relevantly new to the mound after getting some innings last year before having his role expanded this year.  Baughn preformed admirably though and threw four innings with nearly 60 percent of his pitches being strikes.
“Hunter always will come up and give you a bunch of innings,” Dillow said. “He throws a lot of strikes and we know what Hunter will give us when he goes out there. We just have to play defense behind him.”
The young pitcher exited after four innings and 64 pitches as Dillow attempts to save him for the Chanute Tournament which will run Friday through Sunday. Baughn left with the game deadlocked at 5-5.
The bullpen was unable to get the game into extra innings with Chanute’s Logan McDonald coming through with a one-out, walk-off single in the fifth inning.
Baughn wasn’t the only bright spot for the Indians in game two. Drake Sellman had a very good game at the plate, going 2-for-3 with a double.
“I have no issues with the way we swing the bats,” Dillow said. “We are always going to swing the bats. We had some miscues on the bases that we need to get better at, but other than that we are swinging the bat really well.”
Teryn Johnson led the team with a pair of RBIs.

GAME ONE
The opener didn’t end up being the nail-biter that the second game was, but the Indians did manage a strong start.
Iola took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first on a RBI by Baughn to score Sellman.
Johnson also opened the game with a shutout inning, but in the second frame Chanute was able to flip the script.
They took a 3-1 as Johnson began to battle his control and allowed four walks in the innings and a two-run single by McDonald.
Chanute tacked on three more runs in the fourth inning off of reliever Kyle O’Neal.
The Indians were able to battle back for two runs in the top of the fourth inning with Xavier Bauer leading off with a double and Josh Hull cashing in later with a two-run double scoring Bauer and Logan Dillow.
Chanute was able to quickly regain momentum with a run in the fourth and three more in the fifth, before they score one to run-rule the Indians 11-3 after six innings.
Bauer led the Indians offensive attack with a pair of hits.
O’Neal quietly played a very valuable role as he pitched the final 3 1/3 innings to save the rest of the team’s bullpen for the weekend.

UP NEXT
The Indians will play in the Chanute Tournament this weekend.
The Iola Double-A team will play Neosho County tonight at 7 p.m., at Riverside Park.

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