Crofton edges Wynot in South Central League contest

CROFTON — It was a busy week for the Wynot Expos before celebrating America’s 244th birthday.

The Expos started it with an impressive 16-8 rout of one of the top teams – Tabor — in the South Central Division before seeing the momentum slip away in subsequent losses at home against Menno, 17-4, and at Crofton, 3-2. 

In between all of that was a contentious 6-3 win at Irene, one of the league’s lower ranked teams.

Wynot (5-8) was tied for seventh place heading into this week’s action.

“Our starting pitching is improving, and they are going deep into games,” player/coach Lee Heimes said. “Our defense is also improving with our hitting.  We need to work on being consistent in all three phases.”

The team is still battling the snags the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked on the league.

“The biggest issue with Covid was that our season didn’t start on time,” Heimes said. “However, we are playing all the games in our league which has condensed our schedule with more games per week.  Thus, the pitching is a challenge with taking care of arms and having quality pitching.”

In the win over Tabor, Jalen Wieseler (2-for-5, three runs, RBI), Heimes (2-for-4, three runs, RBI), Kyle Wiepen (2-for-4 homer, three RBI, three runs) and Jackson Sudbeck (2-for-4, three RBI) led the offense, while Dain Whitmire pitched seven innings for the win.

In the loss to Menno, Wieseler, Heimes, Wiepen and Dawson Sudbeck recorded a hit.

In the win against Irene, Scott Morrison pitched seven innings for the win while Jackson Sudbeck earned the save. Jalen and Landon Wieseler each went 2-for-5 at the plate.

Wynot had a chance for a winning week before dropping the decision at Crofton Friday despite Jalen Wieseler’s strong nine innings pitched from the bump.

Wynot played host to Irene Tuesday and will travel to Lesterville Thursday and host Crofton Friday before taking on the league leading Yankton Tappers at home Sunday.

The Crofton Bluejays went 2-1 to quietly move to 6-6 and into a tie for fifth place in the standings.

Crofton won at the Yankton Lakers, 6-2, while also beating Wynot. The Bluejays dropped a 2-1, 13-inning decision in between their triumphs.

Coach Ben Hegge was pleased with the pitching of his squad as James Kaiser pitched a three-hitter to beat the Lakers and Capp Bengston went 9.1 innings with one-earned run allowed in the Freeman loss.

Tyler Priest struck out 11 to throw a complete game in the Wynot win.

“Our pitching and defense are really coming along,” Hegge said. “We held teams to two runs per game this week which can win you a lot of ballgames.”

The Crofton bats were led by Alec Martin’s three-hit game which included a homer against the Lakers, Seth Wiebelhaus and his four-hit week while Hegge, Carter Roach and James Kaiser all had a multi-hit game this past week.

“We’ve been trying to find our own offensively,” Hegge said. “We’re hitting balls hard but not finding a ton of holes. Also missing a few timely hits.”

Crofton played host to Irene Sunday and will host Freeman Thursday before heading to Wynot over the upcoming weekend.

“This season is a true grind,” Hegge said. “Teams aren’t used to playing three games a week - because of the late start with COVID. It takes guys showing up night in and night out and grinding away and putting your best effort out there. We have a deep team with contributions coming from everywhere so three games a week hasn’t been an issue at all.”