Legion baseball: Eau Claire's rally falls short against Sheboygan at state tournament
Jul. 28—For the first time in more than a week, the Eau Claire Pizza Hut Post 53 Legion baseball team's offense met a challenge it couldn't quite overcome.
Eau Claire couldn't figure out Sheboygan southpaw Kyle Damrow until it was too late, and saw its rally fall short in a 5-4 defeat at the Class AAA state tournament on Wednesday in Sheboygan. Eau Claire fell behind 5-1, and despite a late push, couldn't quite make up the deficit.
The defeat sends Eau Claire into an elimination game on Thursday. They'll face Middleton at 4 p.m. with the loser's season coming to an end.
Damrow ensured Sheboygan would remain unbeaten at the double-elimination tournament. The lefty used his sweeping breaking ball to keep Eau Claire off balance across five-plus innings. He struck out four and allowed four runs, but three of the four came in the sixth inning.
Eau Claire hammered 17 hits in its tournament-opening victory over Marshfield on Tuesday, but managed seven against Damrow. Meanwhile, Post 53 pitcher Henry Wilkinson had some tough luck over the course of the night. Sheboygan saw several softly-hit balls drop in for hits. Wilkinson struck out six across 5.1 innings of work.
Sheboygan took a 2-0 lead in the first on a bloop single to right field and an RBI fielder's choice by Caleb Salm and Dane Nickolai, respectively. Post 83 tacked on a third run when a throw to second base allowed a runner at third base to scamper home in the third.
Eau Claire got a run back on Jack Redwine's RBI triple to center field in the fourth, but Sheboygan returned the favor when Ian Merry repeated the feat in the fifth to make it 4-1. Merry later came in to score to pad Sheboygan's lead to four runs.
Sam Feck hit an RBI single in the sixth for Eau Claire, and Redwine pulled them to within one run of the lead with a two-RBI double later in the frame.
Jack Kein reached base representing the tying run in the seventh, but Eau Claire couldn't move him beyond first.
Sheboygan 5, Eau Claire 4
Eau Claire 000 103 0 — 4 9 1
Sheboygan 201 020 X — 5 9 0
WP: Kyle Damrow (5.1 IP, 7 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 4 K, 1 BB). LP: Henry Wilkinson (5.1 IP, 9 H, 5 R, 4 ER, 6 K, 1 BB). Leading hitters: Eau Claire: Jack Redwine 2-3 (2B, 3B, 3 RBI), Jack Kein 2-4, Jonah Hanson 2-3 (2B), Sam Feck 1-3 (RBI).
