(Guthrie Center, IA) — AC/GC trailed early and withstood a rally from Madrid to win a West Central Conference match up on Monday night 8-4.
Noah Kading gave the Chargers five solid innings on the mound, Taytum Bates got two hits and 2 RBI and Madrid left a small army on the basepaths.
The Tigers scored twice in the top of the first inning off Kading — Emerson Bridgewater led off the game with a single and was bunted over to 2nd and then stole third. With 2 outs, Kolbie Owens walked and then the Chargers made back to back errors to plate two runs for Madrid for a 2-0 lead.
It stayed that way until the bottom of the 3rd — with two on and two out, Ben Franzeen drove one in to the wall in center for a 2 run double to tie the game at 2-2.
In the bottom of the 4th, the Madrid starter Bridgewater hit Bates with a pitch and moved to third on bad pickoff attempt and would score on a RBI single from Blaize Dorsey to make it 3-2 Chargers. They added three runs in the bottom of the 5th against Madrid reliever Levi Kockler on a RBI single from Noah Kading, an error on a ball hit by Bates, and a wild pitch to make it 6-2.
Madrid got baserunners on against Kading but could not get the key hits. A walk and an error in the 2nd; a hit by pitch in the third; two walks in the 4th; a walk and single in the 5th. The Tigers finally got something in the 6th — Mason Mormon reached on an infield single that knocked Kading from the game with 98 pitches. In came Tommy Skram and he committed two balks to score a run, Bridgewater single and later scored on a RBI hit from Owens to make it 6-4.
The Chargers got those runs back in the bottom of the 6th on a two out 2 run single from Bates to make it 8-4.
Skram gave up a hit by pitch to lead off the 7th and two outs later gave up back to back walks to load the bases and bring the tying run to the plate but Skram struck out Eli Petersen to end the game.
Bates had a big game at the plate, reaching base all four times, going 2-3 with 2 RBI and a run scored
For Madrid, Bridgewater went 4 innings and allowed 3 earned runs on 4 hits, walked two and struck out 4 and went 2-3 at the plate with 2 walks and his courtesy runner scored twice.
For AC/GC, Blaize Dorsey was 1-2 with a RBI; Ben Franzeen was 2-2 with 2 walks and 2 RBI, Chase Slaybaugh was 0-1 with 2 walks and 2 runs. Will Skram was 2-3 with 3 runs.
Line Score
Madrid (6-14, 3-12) — 4 runs, 5 hits, 2 errors, 13 LOB
AC/GC (9-11, 6-10) — 8 runs, 9 hits, 3 errors, 8 LOB
W: Noah Kading (3-2)
L: Emerson Bridgewater (1-2)
Time: 2:11
