The Northfield Raiders remembered what it was like to watch the Byron Bears hoist up the 2023 Section 1AAA baseball championship and celebrate their advancement to the Class AAA state tournament.
They initially lost to the Bears in the championship semifinals, pulled out a win over Winona in the elimination finals and got their shot at rematching with Byron. Northfield won the first game, but the extra game advantage for the semifinals winner aided the Bears with a close 8-7 victory over the Raiders ending Northfield’s season and extending Byron’s.
But under the lights at Marcusen Park in Austin on Wednesday night, the No. 2 seeded Raiders found themselves on the opposite end of last season’s conclusion.
“For our seniors that were there last year, we talked about the feeling they had sitting there and watching Byron celebrate,” said head coach Josh Spitzack. “They said last year that they’d get back (to the title game) and finish it. So happy for those guys and our entire team. This was a goal we had at the beginning of the season and it’s awesome to see them make that happen.”
A 6-0 loss to top-seeded Stewartville in the first game was followed by Northfield’s 3-2 victory in the second game that put the Section 1AAA title in the Raiders’ hands as they returned to the state tournament for the first time since 2016.
The Stewartville Tigers have been one of the top teams in Class AAA baseball all season long. They entered the section tournament with an 18-1 record –which included a 6-4 road win over the Raiders to close the regular season– and the No. 1 seed.
Despite it all, the No. 2 seeded Raiders were more than confident. They shut out No. 7 Red Wing 9-0, got revenge on No. 3 Byron with a 9-1 victory and put up 11 runs to hand Stewartville just its second loss all season.
The Tigers, sitting in the same spot as Northfield last season, answered with an 11-0 elimination bracket victory over Winona to get another crack at the semifinals winner. But in order to win the title over Northfield, the Tigers would have to win two straight games, while the Raiders just needed one.
Game one just seemed destined to go to the Tigers. They caught a runner stealing to open the game before scoring two runs off an error and adding a third run off an RBI double to take a 3-0 lead with the momentum.
Northfield kept things close with some strong pitching from senior Tegan Mellgren, but a couple of errors and bobbles in the field, plus some cold Raider bats kept Northfield trailing by three runs until Stewartville clinched the game with a three-run fifth inning.
“Obviously, we would’ve liked to have gotten it done in one game, but we knew we had pitchers ready to go tonight,” Spitzack said. “So if the first game didn’t work out, we felt confident we’d come back and take that second one.”
Even though the Raiders had just gotten shut out with little offense against a very strong Tigers team that wasn’t going to pull any punches, they remained confident with Game No. 2 in their back pockets.
Seth Thompson stepped on the mound for the Raiders in the second game and the Tigers immediately struggled to hit off the junior. In total, Thompson racked up 11 strikeouts and just needed the bats to provide a bit of support.
“It feels amazing,” Thompson said. “We kept the confidence we had at the beginning of the game. After we lost that first, we still knew we could pull it off. We all kept our confidence between ourselves and felt pretty good about (the second game).”
JT Graupmann was the first to respond when he hit a deep sac fly in right field foul territory, which allowed a courtesy-running Logan Prescott to tag from third and score Northfield’s first run of the night.
Austin Koep made sure the momentum continued siding with the Raiders as the senior outfielder blasted a solo home run in the sixth inning to give them a 2-0 lead. Kyan Rauk gave them an extra insurance run by hitting an RBI single into center to put Northfield up by three runs.
“I was struggling the first game and the start of the second game,” Koep said. “I had to come through, I had to make some adjustments, come through for the team and get the victory.”
With backs against the wall, the Tigers attempted a rally in the bottom of the seventh, which resulted in them cutting Northfield’s lead down to 3-2 with a drive into the left field bringing in two runs.
Thompson started the inning with a strikeout and responded to the two runs by recording another strikeout. With two outs and the tying run on second, the Raiders turned to Graupmann to close out the game.
The sophomore only needed four pitches to record the game-sealing strikeout that sends Northfield to the Class AAA state tournament.
After coming up just short in past seasons and being the ones to watch the celebration last year, finally getting to hold the section trophy is a sweet feeling for Northfield. Especially with an important senior class leading the way.
“This group of seniors have been together from first grade until now,” Koep said on behalf of the senior core. “We needed this. We’ve had so much success in the past, but we needed the state appearance.”
Action for the Class AAA Baseball State Tournament will start on Thursday, June 13, at the Chaska Athletic Park.
Most Popular
Comments / 0