ELY—The Hibbing American Legion baseball team went 4-0 to win the Ely Midsummer Classic at Memorial Field Thursday through Saturday.
In game one Thursday, Post 222 beat Thunder Bay 26-6 to open the tourney.,
Hibbing starting pitcher Logan Gietzen gave up two runs in the first inning, but Post 222 came back with four runs in the bottom of the first.
In the second, Thunder Bay hit a grand slam to make it 6-4, but Hibbing scored twice in the bottom of the second to tie it 6-6.
Gietzen, who had thrown between 60 and 70 pitches in the first two innings, had a quick third inning, then Post 222 scored six runs to make it 12-6.
In the bottom of the fourth, Hibbing used some walks, errors and hits to score 14 runs.
The big hit was a grand slam by Dakota Kruse that cleared the fence in right-center field.
“Everybody got a hit through the whole lineup, which generated our runs,” Hibbing coach Logan Radovich said. “We started out on a high note.”
Hibbing’s second game was against International Falls Friday.
Beau Frider started on the mound and had a rough first inning, spotting International Falls a 5-0 lead.
Post 222 got one run back in the bottom of the first, but Radovich could feels an sense of uneasiness.
“Beau was throwing strikes, but the were like, ‘It’s International Falls, we’ll beat them.’”
International Falls made it 6-1 in the third, but Hibbing came back with a run in the bottom of the third to make it 6-2.
Frider shutdown International Falls from the third inning on, setting the stage for an unusual seventh inning.
Hibbing scratched out two runs to make it 6-4.
With a runner on second and two out, Jack Bautch hit a ground ball between shortstop and third base.
The throw to first bounced in the dirt, allowing Bautch to reach on an error, and scoring Post 222’s fifth run of the game.
Bautch attempted to go to second base, but he was thrown out for the final out of the inning, seemingly ending the game.
Upon further review, the ball was deemed to have gone out of play in the dugout, and the umpires reversed the call.
Frider singled to tie the game 6-6, then he stole second.
Logan Maxwell came to the plate and hit a walkoff single to give Hibbing the win.
“That was probably the ugliest win I’ve seen since I’ve been coaching,” Radovich said. “But I’ll take an ugly win over a good, tough loss.”
On Friday night, Hibbing took on Warroad and got a 4-0 win in Soudan.
Luke Nelson got the pitching win, tossing seven innings of four-hit ball, striking out six. He only threw 65 pitches.
Noah Sundquist led off with a triple in the first inning, then scored on a sacrifice fly by Dane Mammenga.
In the third inning, Sundquist doubled, took third on a passed ball and scored when Mammenga hit an RBI groundout.
Kruse tripled, then Gietzen knocked him in with a base hit,.
Post 222 added one more run in the fifth.
On Saturday, Hibbing took on Viroqua and came away with a 6-1 victory.
Kruse was the winning pitcher, striking out six and throwing just 68 pitches.
After a quick top of the first, Sundquist reached base, then Kruse hit a two-run home run to make it 2-0.
Hibbing scored four runs in the third, then Viroqua scored once in the fourth to make it 6-1.
Viroqua got a lead-off double in the fifth, but the batter was called out for missing first base.
“That was fortunate for us, but unfortunate for them at the moment,” Radovich said.
In the sixth inning, there was a lightning delay for a half hour, but when play should have resumed, the Viroqua coaching staff called the game and Post 222 got the win.
That sets up a big week for Hibbing as it takes on Rock Ridge today at 6 p.m. at Frandsen Bank and Trust Field; on Tuesday, Post 222 goes to Grand Rapids, then on Thursday, Grand Rapids comes to Hibbing.
Post 222 will play in the Princeton Tournament over the weekend.
“We almost had the hiccup against International Falls, but our guys said, ‘Hey, let’s play our own game and not worry about anybody else,” Radovich said. “We had hits throughout the lineup.
“We were getting bunts down, and we did our hit-and-runs to perfection. We’re starting to move in the right direction. We’re getting hot during the last week of the season. We’ll take it one-game-at-a-time, and hopefully, have the mindset and mentality going through this week.”
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