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SUTTON — After both teams suffered disheartening losses in the opening round of the Class C Senior American Legion State Tournament at DLD Park Saturday, Pender Post 55 and Hartington Post 4 knocked heads Sunday in an elimination game, which Pender Frontier Bank eliminated Hartington, 13-8.
Pender was cruising along with a 4-0 lead in the first-round game with St. Paul and saw a St. Paul comeback to hand the Northeast Nebraska team a 5-4 loss with five runs in the seventh, all of them scored with two outs.
Pender bounced back strong against Hartington on Sunday.
“We showed a lot of guts and perseverance here today against a very good Hartington team,” said Post 55 skipper, Shane Schuster. “We could have hung our heads and came in here moping today, but we came out firing on all cylinders, hitting the ball, playing defense and taking advantage of what was in front of us.”
Hartington came off of a 3-2 loss to Tecumseh-Johnson. The Hartington bats struggled in that contest before Post 4 finally scored in the final frame, but it wasn’t enough.
“When you get to State, you need to play your best on every play,” said Hartington coach, Don Whitmire. “You can get away with ‘less than your best’ and overcome it during the season, but at state, you need to be at your best every play. We weren’t at our best down here in either game. The effort was there, the outcome wasn’t.”
Frontier Bank jumped out to a 9-0 lead with three runs in the opening frame and six in the third.
The lead grew to 12-0 heading into the Hartington half of the fourth.
Frontier Bank pounded out eight hits in the contest and took advantage of five Hartington errors.
After Pender posted the 12-0 lead, Post 4 finally got some offense going in the fourth.
Hunter Bensen walked then Koby Detlefsen singled into left.
Grady Haberer walked, then Micah Cattau worked a walk after a flyout to send Bensen home before Mav Heine lifted a sacrifice fly to chase Detlefsen across the plate.
Tate Fischer came to the plate and singled on a lined shot to right field which scored Haberer and Cattau to make it 12-4.
In the bottom of the fifth, Detlefsen came to the plate and sent a fly ball to left field which cleared the fence right over the 330-feet mark.
“I knew I hit it well, but I wasn’t sure it was out until I got to first,” said Detlefsen. “I actually missed first base but our coach was telling me to come back and touch the base. It felt really good, but I would have rather won the game.”
Pender added an insurance run in the fifth and the teams went scoreless in the sixth as Post 55 moved onto a Monday elimination game.
“We’ll learn from this and get better,” said Whitmire. “Some days you just don’t have it, and today we didn’t. That’s just the way it is.”
PEN 3 0 6 3 0 1 X - 13 8 2 HAR 0 0 0 4 1 0 X - 5 4 5 WP: Trevor Trimble LP: Koby Detlefsen. 2B: Trevor Trimble (P). 3B: Braylon Wegner (P). HR: Koby Detlefsen (H). Lineup AB R H RBI BB SO Breiton Whitmire 2 0 0 0 0 1 Drey Puppe 1 0 0 0 0 0 Dylan Taylor 3 0 1 0 0 0 Hunter Bensen 2 1 0 0 1 1 Koby Detlefsen 3 2 2 1 0 0 Grady Haberer 2 1 0 0 1 0 Brady Hochstein 3 0 0 0 0 1 Micah Cattau 2 1 0 1 1 1 Mav Heine 2 0 0 1 0 1 Tate Fischer 3 0 1 2 0 0 TEAM 23 5 4 5 3 5 T-J 0 0 1 2 0 0 0 - 3 5 2 HAR0000002-241 WP: Zach Hawley LP: Brady Hochstein S: Tate Hawley. 2B: Hunter Bensen (H); Wesley Swanson (T). Lineup AB R H RBI BB SO Breiton Whitmire 4 0 1 0 0 1 Dylan Taylor 2 0 0 0 2 1 Hunter Bensen 4 0 1 0 0 1 Koby Detlefsen 2 0 1 0 0 1 Grady Haberer 3 0 0 0 0 1 Brady Hochstein 2 1 0 0 1 1 Micah Cattau 2 0 0 0 0 2 Tate Fischer 1 1 1 0 0 0 Easton Hochstein 2 0 0 0 0 1 Mav Heine 3 0 0 1 0 2 TEAM 25 2 4 1 4 11
