Centerville -- After a victory against Marshalltown in their first postseason test, Indian Hills lost a winner's bracket game to Iowa Western, then saw Marshalltown turn around and avenge their earlier loss to bring an end to IHCC's season. The Falcons used another strong pitching performance from Wyatt Wendell to knock off MCC, 7-3, on Friday. Saturday, though, began with a 12-2 defeat at the hands of Iowa Western, then a 10-5 knockout loss to Marshalltown.
Wendell was superb all season long against conference opponents and he supplied six quality innings against Marshalltown on Friday, scattering eight hits with six strikeouts. The freshman righthander had a season record of 7-4 and was 6-1 vs. league foes. Nick Marshall threw three innings of relief to save the victory for IHCC. The bottom of the batting order did a great job offensively. Dave Janssen belted his first home run of the season and knocked in four runs. Alex Fisher had two hits and scored twice, Declan Buckle was 3-for-4 with a double and two stolen bases, and Ryo Yamaguchi had two RBIs. Indian Hills trailed 2-0 after an inning and a half, then scored once in the 2nd, four times in the 4th and two more in the 6th to pull out the win.
"The game started off slow for us," observed IHCC coach Matthew Torrez, "as Marshalltown did a good job of attacking early. We settled in though and battled right back. The lower half of our lineup did the most damage. Once we got some confidence going things really turned around. Quality at-bats were the key."
Indian Hills actually had a brief lead in the game against Iowa Western, scoring in the top of the 1st. But the Reivers stormed back with a five-run 1st and went on to win in five innings. Fisher singled in Jet Weber in the 1st and Fisher's grounder scored Weber in the 3rd for the two IHCC runs. Buckle had two of his team's five hits. Omar Vigil started and lasted only a third of an inning and took the loss.
Marshalltown used a big inning to clinch the consolation bracket win, tallying six runs in the 7th to extend a 3-1 lead. The Falcons used five pitchers in the 7th to try and stem the tide. Weber and Buckle each had three-hit games, with Buckle going deep for the first time this spring. Jameson Hart had two hits for Indian Hills. "At this time of year it's about making plays and playing your best baseball," Torrez said, "and we had a tough time doing that today," after the Falcons dropped their second contest of the day and saw their season come to an end.
IHCC finished with a 25-26 record. Eleven sophomores ended their Indian Hills careers with the loss to MCC.
Iowa Western defeated Marshalltown to win the region tournament.