GROVE – When teams play four games in three days, like they did at the Grand Lake Baseball Classic over the weekend, sometimes they run out of pitching.
The result is what happened between the Grove Ridgerunners and the Oologah Mustangs in the third place game on Saturday, as the two teams combined for 24 hits and 25 runs in a 13-12 Ridgerunner win.
The two teams traded big innings and the lead throughout the game. The Mustangs (14-9) struck first, getting four runs on four hits and a walk in the top of the first inning.
Grove countered that with six runs in the second, getting RBIs from Jake Spychalski, Gibson Russ, Justin Tesreau and Erick Ryan, as well as a pair of errors from the Mustangs, to take the lead.
Oologah got four runs in the fourth and three more in the fifth to take an 11-8 lead, but Grove got a run on a wild pitch and a two-RBI single from Russ to tie the score in the bottom of the fifth.
Trailing in the fifth, and having already gone through two pitchers, Bouher turned to an unlikely reliever, as catcher Justin Tesreau took the mound for the first time all season.
“When you go and play four games in three days and everybody has certain guys that they count on to pitch you’re going to get down to some guys that may not have thrown a lot of innings,” Bouher said. “You never know who that guy is going to be and you get to regional play and the same thing can happen.”
Tesreau got the job done, finishing the final 2.2 innings, giving up just one run on two hits and three walks.
The Ridgerunners (14-8) got the deciding runs in the bottom of the sixth inning. With the bases loaded and two outs, second baseman Kody Stephenson got the game-winning hit for the second game in a row, driving in Spychalski and Ty Phillips with a single to right centerfield for a 13-11 lead.
The Mustangs loaded the bases in their final at-bat in the top of the seventh, but after a sacrifice fly scored one run, another fly ball to left field finally ended the game.
“That’s the first time Justin’s been on the mound all year and he comes in and gets the win,” Bouher said. “Hopefully these things build for that kind of moment when it really counts and really matters somebody’s ready to step up and do something.”
The three consecutive wins give the Ridgerunners some momentum as they head back into district play next week. Grove will travel to Miami on Monday and Locust Grove on Tuesday before a pair of games against Collinsville on Thursday and Friday begins the home stretch of the season. The Ridgerunners will finish the final two weeks of the season with nine consecutive district games, looking to finish at least second in order to host a regional.
