Entering last week’s Seymour Wood Bat Tournament winners of six straight games, the Mansfield Lions baseball team had high hopes for a solid finish against a loaded field of solid baseball programs.
Unfortunately, the Lions struggled on the Seymour diamond.
Against a 13-win Marion C. Early team, the Lions closed the gap to 4-2 in the fifth inning, but were unable to get any closer as their offense had just two hits.
Trevor Williams and Tanner Indendi each had one RBI while Carter Garrison and Jack Grubbs each scored one run.
Dylan Robertson tossed seven innings and allowed four earned runs on six hits with five strikeouts.
Against the host Tigers, pitcher Kellar Davis was locked into a pitcher’s duel with a familiar a pitcher the Lions were familiar with in Chade Noble.
The two pitchers combined to allow no earned runs in nearly 14 innings. They combined for 22 strikeouts and gave up just five hits.
With the game tied in Seymour’s final at-bat, an error led to the Tigers scoring the winning run.
Davis went six and two-thirds innings and allowed no earned runs on three hits with seven strikeouts.
Noble struck out 15 batters in seven innings. He allowed no earned runs and two hits.
Davis and Williams each had hits in the loss.
Before the tournament, the Lions’ offense had no trouble scoring runs against Lighthouse Christian out of Springfield.
With a slim 12-10 lead after just two innings, the Lions pulled away with a 13-run bottom of the third to seal a 15-run mercy victory.
Mansfield’s offense had 18 hits in the win.
Kaden Coble had three hits and five RBIs; Davis added three hits, four RBIs and three runs scored; and Carter Brooke had four RBIs and two runs scored. Ryin Long had three hits, two RBIs and four runs scored; Williams had two RBIs and three runs scored; Madix Gray had two RBIs and two runs scored; Brayden Barnett added two RBIs; Grubbs had one RBI and scored three times; Ashton Pierson scored three times; Dylan Robertson and Brock Gray scored twice; and Austin Kingery scored one run.
