Waseca drops weekend doubleheader to Marshall

After bus troubles caused a roughly hourlong delay for the visiting Marshall baseball team, the Waseca Bluejays hosted the Tigers in a Saturday afternoon doubleheader. In game one, the Bluejays made a late rally that fell just short in a 5-4 loss before Marshall cruised to an 11-1 victory in game two.

With the losses, Waseca stands with a record of 2-11 (0-9 BSB) on the season.

Game one saw the Bluejays burst ahead 3-0 in the top of the first inning with a pair of errors and an RBI single responsible for the trio of runs. The Jays responded with a pair of runs in the bottom of the first after Sebastian Teague ripped a two-out, two-run single into right field.

Marshall added two runs in the top of the second, each coming on sacrifice fly balls, but the Waseca defense would shut them down for the remainder of game one.

The game’s score would remain unchanged until the bottom of the seventh inning when the Jays, down to their final three outs, put together a last-minute challenge. Jacob Thompson hit a leadoff single and an error at shortstop allowed Max Wirtz to reach safely to put two runners on base with just one out.

A full-count strikeout gave Waseca just one out and Keaton Roeker ripped a two-run double to left field, scoring Thompson and Wirtz to cut the deficit to just a single run. Nate Engel-Mueller was then hit by a pitch to put the go ahead run at first but a groundout to third ended any hope of a comeback for the Jays.

Colton Ruedy started on the mound for Waseca, pitching four and one third innings while allowing five runs, only one of them earned, on three hits while striking out four.

Roeker led the offense, going 2-3 with two runs batted in and a walk out of the leadoff spot while Teague and Thompson each added a hit.

In game two, the offense for Waseca completely dried up as the team managed only a single hit, a Carter Ellis single in the top of the fourth inning, while the lone run coming on a balk that scored Teague.

Marshall’s 11-1 victory came in the bottom of the sixth when the final run needed for the run rule was scored on a fly ball to right that found some open space.

The Bluejays will return to the baseball field Monday, May 13, when they travel to Le Sueur-Henderson’s Bruce Frank Field to take on the Giants. First pitch is scheduled for 5 p.m.