Beal City Sets Tone, USA Enjoys Prime Time
By
Tom Markowski
Special for Second Half
June 15, 2018
EAST LANSING – The moment. The venue. It all got to Beal City’s Keegan Haynes as he took the mound to begin his team’s Division 4 Semifinal against Gaylord St. Mary on Saturday.
Haynes retired the first batter, gave up a base hit and proceeded to throw 10 straight balls walking the bases full before going 2-0 on the fifth batter, Alex Pudvan. Aggies coach Steve Pickens came out to talk to his junior pitcher, settle him down and hopefully instill some confidence.
Haynes threw a strike and then got a bouncer to start a double play, pitcher to home to first. Just like that, the Aggies escaped the top of the first inning unscathed – and that changed everything.
Beal City scored twice in the bottom of the inning and tacked on four more runs in the second on the way to defeating St. Mary 7-3 at McLane Stadium to advance to Saturday’s championship game, which will be its first since 2014.
Beal City (22-8), winners of three previous MHSAA baseball titles, will play first-time finalist Unionville-Sebewaing (22-15) at 2:30 p.m. USA scored four in the first inning and went on to defeat St. Joseph Lake Michigan Catholic, 5-1, in the second Semifinal.
“That pretty much defined the game for us,” St. Mary coach Matt Nowicki said. “That first (inning) could have been promising for us.”
Instead of scoring a run or more, and perhaps knocking Haynes out of the game, St. Mary was deflated.
Conversely, Beal City got pumped up. Run-scoring singles by Haynes and catcher Cameron Lynch staked Haynes to a 2-0 lead. When the Aggies added four the next inning, keyed by Kollion Sharrar’s two-run triple, Haynes and Beal City were in command.
“I told (Haynes) to trust his defense,” Pickens said. “With that double play, we were only one pitch away from getting out of the inning.
“Hey, that’s a good team over there. We scored a number of runs today with two outs. We’re getting some timely hitting. We were moving the ball. We didn’t strike out much (four times) today.”
St. Mary (26-6) scored all of its runs in the fifth inning, stringing together five consecutive singles to knock Haynes out of the game. That was good and bad news for the Snowbirds. They finally got on the board, but the run also prompted Pickens to bring in his ace. Senior Brett Upton, 11-2 on the season, fanned the first two batters he faced, then got a pop out to shortstop that stranded two runners.
Upton, who threw 23 pitches in retiring all five batters he faced, will be ready to start on the mound in the title game.
“I had all the confidence in the world in (Haynes),” Upton said. “I wasn’t coming in at that time anyway. We had all the confidence in the world in our offense and that we’d come back and score. That double play was a big momentum swing. That was huge for us. The plan for me today was to come in for an inning or so and get used to the mound. I’m ready.”
Aaron Schafer relieved Upton in the sixth and got the final four outs.
Haynes got credit for the win and he also went 3 for 3 with two RBI.
“The nerves got the best of me in that first inning,” Haynes said. “(Pickens) said to me to throw strikes and calm down. Giving up no runs in the first, that was the best-case scenario. This is the biggest game I’ve ever pitched in.”
For St. Mary, Drew Long went all six innings and pitched well after the first two. Joseph Moeggenberg had two hits and an RBI.
Unionville-Sebewaing 5, St. Joseph Lake Michigan Catholic 1
Brendan Prime went the first 5 1/3 innings for USA to earn the victory. He survived a shaky start, and when his pitch count ran out, Devin Riskey came to his rescue. Riskey, likely Saturday’s starting pitcher, allowed one hit and struck out two in his 1 2/3 innings of work.
Prime allowed three hits and one run in the first inning, and allowed just one hit after.
“I don’t think I was in a groove yet,” Prime said. “After those four runs, when they got that one, I didn’t think about it much.”
Last season USA scored a bunch of runs early in a Division 4 Semifinal but failed to close out Portland St. Patrick. USA led 7-3 after three innings in that one before St. Patrick came back to win, 12-8, and go on to claim the championship.
“I thought back to St. Patrick last year,” USA coach Tyler Bader said. “We talk about getting to teams early. We wanted to stay on top. Stay on top. Stay on top.
“I felt we were going to do well in the tournament in the Districts. We’re not done yet.”
USA batted around in the first inning; the big hit was Braden Carter’s two-run single.
For Lake Michigan Catholic (27-4), starting pitcher Matthew Defay had a triple and scored on Jacob Kissane’s sacrifice fly. Defay gave up all five runs, but only two were earned.
VIDEO: Unionville-Sebewaing's four-run first inning was highlighted by this two-run single by Braden Carter.
PHOTOS: (Top) A Beal City runner tries to beat a throw to third base during his team’s Semifinal win over Gaylord St. Mary. (Middle) Unionville-Sebewaing’s Brendan Prime delivers a pitch as the Patriots earned a trip to Saturday’s championship game.
Aces Lead Holland Christian, Linden in D2
June 16, 2016
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
EAST LANSING – Mike Mokma had four innings Thursday morning to scout DeWitt’s lineup as he watched his school’s first MHSAA Semifinal from his post at first base.
As if the Holland Christian ace needed help, he also appears to take exceptional mental notes.
Mokma moved to the mound for the fifth inning, relieving teammate David Williams, and struck out five of nine batters he faced over three innings as the Maroons rallied to claim a 4-3 win over DeWitt and their first championship game berth.
Mokma, a senior who has signed with Michigan State University, improved to 14-0 this season and almost surely will get the call at McLane Stadium to pitch Saturday’s 9 a.m. Final.
“(Coach Jim) Caserta said entering the fifth inning to get ready, to start being ready mentally. Just staying in the game with every pitch, knowing what the hitter’s doing,” said Mokma, who struck out the side upon entering in the fifth inning with a runner on and a run just scored for DeWitt.
“The momentum swung from them to us,” Mokma added, “so it was good.”
Holland Christian (35-6), ranked No. 3 at the end of the regular season, will face No. 5 Linden on Saturday. Caserta, who led Holland West Ottawa to the Division 1 title in 2003 and is in his third season with the Maroons, will have the opportunity to become the first coach in MHSAA history to lead two programs to baseball titles.
His team advanced with a late and opportunistic rally after DeWitt took a 2-0 lead during the bottom of the fourth inning.
Holland Christian came back with two runs in the top of the fifth to tie the score. DeWitt scored its second go-ahead run in the bottom of that inning off Williams, leading to the pitching change.
Holland Christian tied it up again in the top of the sixth as junior Brady Brower singled home senior Josh Sterenberg, who had moved to third base on a passed ball. After Mokma retired DeWitt in order in the bottom of the sixth, Sterenberg had a hand in the winning run as well with a sacrifice fly to drive home junior pinch runner Cam Schut, who had made it to third on an error.
Mokma retired DeWitt’s final three batters in order to end the game.
“We had confidence in David. He’s been throwing great, so we felt coming in he was a little more rested than Mike was,” Caserta said. “(Mokma) could’ve started the game, but Mike will do what we need for the team. He’ll start, he’ll relieve; he’ll do what we need. He’s also carried us at the plate all year.”
Williams, who will play next season at Xavier University, gave up only one earned run over his four innings before moving behind the plate when Mokma came on in relief. DeWitt had only five hits, including two by sophomore catcher Kade Preston.
DeWitt junior Michael Stygles gave up only one earned run throwing all seven innings for the Panthers (30-10-1), who made their second Semifinal appearance in three seasons and graduate only two starters from Thursday’s lineup.
“It’s great to see the kids accomplish what they set out to do, especially when you set your goals this high,” DeWitt coach Al Shankel said. “To get here was great. We wanted a couple more.
“We felt we could get to their starter, and we started hitting the ball pretty hard off him. Credit to them that they went to (Mokma), because I think that would’ve continued.”
Linden 5, Dearborn Divine Child 2
While the rain began to fall harder Thursday, Linden’s spirits soared as it earned its first championship game berth since 2004 with a comeback win over the five-time champion Falcons.
Junior pitcher Lucas Marshall allowed only one earned run and struck out four in tossing a complete game for the Eagles (29-9-1), who increased their postseason run margin to a combined 23-3 over six opponents.
“It just shows that we’re not really the little guy anymore,” Marshall said. “We’re here to play anybody; it doesn’t matter. We’re going to give them our best game.”
Divine Child (27-16) scored the game’s first run in the top of the first inning. But Linden came back with three in the third inning and two in the fourth to put the game away.
Sophomore Nick Koan had a two-run single, the only player on either team to drive in more than one run. Junior Nick Gurney gave up only six hits for Divine Child.
“These guys are just blowing me away,” Linden coach Steve Buerkel said. “Because we lost a strong senior class last year. We had six kids that went on to play college baseball. We returned two starters. … We’ve just got a lot of kids that have a lot of heart and never give up and play hard.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Holland Christian's Chris Mokma lays down a bunt during his team's win over DeWitt at McLane Stadium. (Middle) Linden's Lucas Marshall prepares to unload a pitch during Thursday's Division 2 Semifinal win over Divine Child.