Tiger baseball team's season comes to an end with a loss at region tournament
Fighting an uphill battle after a one-run loss in its second game at the region tournament, the third-seeded Cowley College baseball team had its season come to an end two games later with an 8-6 loss to second-seeded Hutchinson Community College on Friday at Wichita State University's Eck Stadium.
Cowley finishes the season with a record of 43-18, while Hutchinson (51-13) went on to defeat top-seeded Johnson County 11-8 to force a final game before the Cavaliers (52-11) knocked off Hutchinson 14-6 to advance to the JUCO World Series in Grand Junction, CO.
"We fell short of our goals," Cowley head coach Darren Burroughs said. "We did not pitch it extremely well outside of some starts from Cody (Airington), Iziah (Salinas), and Mitchell (Johnson). We blew a couple of leads, but that's baseball."
Earlier on Friday, Cowley won a wild 17-16 contest against the eight-seeded Butler Grizzlies to advance to the semifinals.
Having already used 11 pitchers in the tournament's first three games, Cowley turned to freshman Mitchell Johnson to make his first start since May 3. Johnson gave the Tigers five innings on the mound and left with Cowley trailing 5-4.
Ethan Horton, the Tigers' 13th pitcher used at the tourney, kept the Tigers within a run by holding the Blue Dragons scoreless in the sixth and seventh innings before Hutchinson's Luis Pimental-Guerrero hit a three-run homer in the bottom of the eighth to make the score 8-4.
Down to its final out, Cowley got a two-run double by Jarrett Flaggert and loaded the bases after a single by Cole Martin and a walk to Ian Luce. However, Hutchinson reliever Landon Snyder got Cade Baldridge to fly out to end the game.
Cowley will say goodbye to nine sophomores, Keaton Campbell (.343 average, eight home runs, 66 runs batted in), Jadyn McNealy (.368 average, four home runs, 55 RBI), Cole Martin (.314 average, 23 RBI), Luke Singleton (5-1), Cade Perkins (4-1), Cole Abbott (2-1), Brett McComas (1-2), Drew Duckhorn (0-1), and Cooper Schwindt (.357 on-base percentage).
With a relatively young team this season, the Tigers should return a great deal of experience.
"Hopefully, the young guys take the experience they got this season into next year and are better as sophomores," Burroughs said.
Score by inning: R H E
Cowley 1 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 2 – 6 9 3
Hutch 1 1 0 2 1 0 0 3 x – 8 12 0