Baseball: Van Meter’s unbeaten season continues with substate final win over Pocahontas Area

Tuesday night was business as usual for the Van Meter baseball program.

The Bulldogs beat Pocahontas Area 11-1 in six innings to win Class 2A’s Substate 2 final and secure their spot at next week’s state tournament in Carroll. Van Meter cruised behind a 6-run third inning and Ganon Archer’s 12 strikeouts.

Van Meter is now 36-0 this season, the No. 1-ranked team in Class 2A. Only 11 Iowa baseball teams have completed undefeated summer seasons with state championships. Twin Cedars was the latest, going 36-0 to win Class 1A in 2014.

This Van Meter team is plenty capable of going the distance, but these Bulldogs are very much already an established dynasty.

The Bulldogs have won three consecutive Class 2A state championships. Only six other schools have done that. If they win next week, they would be the fourth to win four in a row: Norway (1981-84), Lansing Kee (1989-92) and West Des Moines Valley (2003-06).

Over the last four years, Van Meter is 124-12 — 34-3 in 2019, 23-2 in 2020, 31-7 last year, and now 36-0 this summer. That includes a 51-game winning streak entering next week’s state tournament at Merchants Park.

This year’s Bulldogs team is as complete as any team they’ve ever fielded.

They have offense, scoring 10-plus runs in 22 of 36 games and hitting 27 total home runs, third-most of any team in the state, regardless of class. Reese Moore, an Iowa recruit, leads the way with 14, tied for the most of any player in Iowa.

They have pitching, with a team ERA of 2.21, third-best among all 2A teams. Archer’s 0.43 ERA over 48.2 innings is the fourth-best among all pitchers with at least 40 innings pitched this summer. He is one of six Van Meter pitchers with a sub-2 ERA.

They have defense, with a team fielding percentage of .956, according to stats kept by Varsity Bound. That’s the second-best among all 2A teams and is tied for 10th among all teams in all classes.

This team is well-equipped for a shot at history next week. It will not be easy. Winning three games in four days is a daunting task, with pitch-count rules and the level of competition they’ll face at Merchants Park.

But these Bulldogs have risen to the challenge time and again over the last year and especially this summer. They’ve given themselves the opportunity to finish the job next week.

The rest is up to them.

Class 2A baseball substate results and notes

Seven other Class 2A substate finals took place Tuesday night, with the winners qualifying for next week's state baseball tournament in Carroll.

Here's a rundown of the results:

• #2 Estherville Lincoln Central 6, Hinton 1 — Owen Larson struck out 9 and allowed 3 hits over 6.2 innings and also went 2-for-4 with 2 RBI for the second-ranked Midgets.

• #7 Dike-New Hartford 11, Osage 10 — Osage scored 7 in the first and led 10-5 in the middle of the 4th, then Dike-New Hartford tied it with a 5-run fourth and walked off in the 7th on Will Textor's RBI single.

• #4 Beckman Catholic 8, Jesup 1 — Nick Schmidt struck out 6 and allowed 4 hits over 7 innings while Nate Offerman went 3-for-3 with 2 RBI for the Trailblazers.

• #3 Cascade 6, West Liberty 3 — Jack Carr pitched a complete-game and Mason Otting finished with 4 RBI. This is the second time that Dubuque County's Cascade and Dyersville Beckman qualified for the state baseball tournament in the same year. (The other year: 1982.)

• Mid-Prairie 3, #6 West Marshall 1 — Mid-Prairie limited West Marshall to just two hits. Collin Miller struck out 12 after coming on in the first with two runners on.

• Interstate-35 5, Davis County 3 — Roadrunners turned a 2-1 deficit into an eventual 5-3 win and qualify for the state tournament for the first time since 2010.

• Kuemper Catholic 6, #5 Clarinda 2 — Clarinda led 2-0, but Kuemper scored 2 runs in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th to win. Cal Wanninger hit a 2-run homer and Logan Sibenaller struck out 6 over 7 innings for Kuemper.

Class 1A baseball substate results and notes

The Class 1A substate finals also took place Tuesday night, with the winners qualifying for next week's state baseball tournament in Carroll.

Here's a rundown of the results:

• #1 Remsen St. Mary's 12, West Harrison 2 — Remsen, now 33-0 this season, scored 4 runs in the first and 4 more in the third.

• #2 Newman Catholic 2, Bishop Garrigan 0 — Newman's Doug Taylor, an Iowa recruit, struck out 10 and allowed 2 hits on just 86 pitches over 7 innings.

• South Winneshiek 2, #4 Kee 0 — South Winneshiek hasn’t allowed a run yet this postseason, outscoring their opponents 16-0 over four games. Against Kee, Keagen Streeter struck out 8 and allowed 2 hits.

• Lisbon 16, #5 Don Bosco 14 — Lisbon scored 11 in the first inning and 4 in the second to lead 15-3, but DB clawed back: 7 in the third, 3 in the fourth, another in the fifth. They never led, but this game was interesting all the way through.

• #6 North Linn 13, Lynnville-Sully 3 — A 6-run second inning blew this one open for the Lynx. Corbin Woods finished 4-for-5 with a double and 4 RBI.

• #3 New London 11, Moravia 1 — The Tigers scored 9 in the first inning and cruised to victory. Dereck Santiago went 2-for-3 with 3 RBI.

• #8 CAM 11, Ogden 1 — The Cougars scored 10 runs in the first two innings while Lane Spieker struck out 7 over five innings.

• #10 Kingsley-Pierson 10, Tri-Center 1 — The Panthers scored 3 runs in the first and 5 more in the fifth.

Cody Goodwin covers wrestling and high school sports for the Des Moines Register. Follow him on Twitter at @codygoodwin.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Van Meter baseball's unbeaten season continues with substate final win