Prep baseball: Rice Lake falls to Denmark in Division 2 state semifinals
Jun. 30—GRAND CHUTE — The Rice Lake baseball team rode a tremendous wave of momentum all the way to Fox Cities Stadium.
But not even that wave could wash out the state's top-ranked team.
Rice Lake saw its postseason run come to an end with a 10-3 defeat to No. 1 Denmark in the Division 2 state semifinals on Wednesday. The Vikings looked every bit the part of the top team in the state, and pulled away to end the Warriors' first trip to state since 1982 in the semis.
It wasn't the way Rice Lake wanted it to end, but it was still a landmark season for the Warriors.
"The high school baseball team's never really been a huge thing in Rice Lake," senior Joe Kroeger said. "It's just been another team. I think we changed that this year. I think this great group of seniors and everybody else just did a great job of turning us around and putting us back on the map."
Denmark (30-1) scored five runs in the bottom of the third inning to break the game open and never looked back. The Vikings rode ace Reece Piontek, who picked up his 11th victory of the season. The Concordia-St. Paul commit pitched six strong innings and struck out five.
He was too tough a puzzle to solve for the Warriors' lineup.
"He did a really good job of getting leadoff batters out," Rice Lake coach Steve Fisher said. "We couldn't do any of our offense that we normally do, as opposed to their offense, which seemed like we had a lot of two-strike (counts) and they came through with the hits. That was basically the difference."
Rice Lake (15-12) battled after falling behind 8-0 in the fourth inning. The Warriors plated a run on an Easton Stone RBI single in the fifth, and Nolan Rowe and Kroeger added RBI singles in the seventh.
"There was no quit. That's probably what I'm most proud of," Fisher said. "Didn't have anyone down on the bench, everyone's head was up. We just kept hitting the ball."
Kroeger had three hits for the Warriors, and Stone added two. Rice Lake had a chance to take the lead in the top of the first inning by getting runners to the corners with two outs, but Piontek came up with a strikeout to end the threat.
In the third, the Vikings got three consecutive run-scoring hits to take a comfortable lead. They scored three more times in the fourth.
The defeat won't neutralize the pride the team took in itself though.
"Obviously it didn't end the way we wanted it to, but it just feels great to know that we had all these guys come together and fight really hard and get as far as we've gotten in 40 years," Kroeger said.
The Warriors will graduate a group of nine seniors, but also will return with a stocked cupboard next spring. Rice Lake's top pitchers all have more high school baseball ahead of them, along with some pieces of the lineup.
"We're looking forward to next year already," Fisher said. "We'll let this one settle in, but we're looking forward to what we can do next year as well.
"Our team was different a little bit today, so I think this experience will help if we get to this spot next year where we can say, 'We were here last year, we've done it. Things will be OK.' So I think this experience bodes well for us next year."
------
Denmark 10, Rice Lake 3
Rice Lake;000;001;2;— 3 8 1
Denmark;005;302;X;— 10 7 4
WP: Reece Piontek (6 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 5 K, 0 BB). LP: Matt Juza (3 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 0 K, 2 BB). Leading hitters: Rice Lake: Joe Kroeger 3-4 (RBI), Easton Stone 2-3 (RBI). Records: Rice Lake 15-12, Denmark 30-1.
