Baseball: Pumas survive and advance

What a rally it was, allowing the Poynette baseball team to keep its season alive.

Plating four runs in their half of the seventh inning, the Pumas (5-15 overall, 1-7 in Capitol North Conference play) forced their regional opener against Wisconsin Heights to go to extra innings, and in the eighth, Poynette scored the game-winner in a 6-5 victory on Thursday, May 23.

“The guys kept battling throughout the whole game, and we were fortunate enough to get four in the seventh,” said Davy Tomlinson, Poynette’s head coach. “We played pretty well, but exploded in the seventh. Hunter Webster had a quality start, and Ashton Meister came on in relief and threw three innings of no-hit ball.”

The win brought the Pumas’ five-game losing streak to a screeching halt, as Chase Hansen scored three runs and stole three bases, going 2-for-4. Chase Maier also went 2-for-4.

Sparkling plays on defense gave Poynette a lift going into its last at-bat.

“We made a couple nice plays in the top of the eighth, and we had momentum as we came to bat,” said Tomlinson. “Chase Hansen was able to get himself to third base with nobody out, and Chase Maier laced a single to left to score him.”

Webster allowed four earned runs and nine hits in five innings of work, while Meister struck out three and walked three.

Going into the game, Poynette was seeded eighth, while Heights was seeded ninth. Heights went into the match-up with only two wins on the season, one coming against Poynette.

Cambridge 7, Poynette 5After scratching and clawing to draw even, with a five-run sixth inning, the Pumas gave up two runs in the top of the seventh to Cambridge and couldn’t rally, despite loading the bases in its half of the seventh on Tuesday, May 21.

“The boys played a really good game today against a quality team,” said Tomlinson. “We had no errors, and our pitchers only walked a couple batters. We were able to stay fairly close, and we came up with the big five-run sixth to tie it up. Unfortunately, they got a couple in the top of the seventh, and we weren’t able to plate any runners in our half of the inning.”

Upcoming games: WIAA Regional Semi-Final at Cambridge slated for Tuesday, May 28. The Blue Jays are the No. 1 seed. The winner will play the winner of the Waterloo-New Glarus game on Wednesday, May 29.