Rangers head east for a road trip to remember
Jun. 23—Laramie's American Legion baseball team took a brief break in Ogallala, Nebraska while on their way to Omaha to compete in one of the largest and prestigious baseball tournaments in the nation.
The Rangers (20-11, 4-4 in AA) will be a part of the 48-team field at the Battle of Omaha. They are scheduled to begin pool play at 1 p.m. today against Williston, North Dakota and have another game against Lincoln Pius X, Nebraska at 3:30 p.m.
On Friday, Laramie will take on Rapid City Sliders, South Dakota at 3:30 p.m. and Elk North, Omaha, at 6 p.m. On Saturday, the Rangers will complete the pool against Bellevue Gross, Nebraska at Noon. Sunday's game is to be determined from the earlier results.
The tournament is annually scheduled to coincide with the NCAA's College World Series in Omaha.
Laramie manager Aaron Lozano considers this particular road trip as a special slot on the schedule in several years for the program.
"Especially to get these guys out there and for an opportunity to play a bunch of teams we may never play again and to get some exposure to what college baseball looks like at the highest level," he said. "It's a cool opportunity for our guys to go on this trip.
"We have tickets to go to game one of the (College World Series) championship series when the teams are down to two. We are pretty excited about that. They've been following the College World Series more closely this year because they knew they would get to see some of these teams. It's also been fun to follow college baseball this season and try to predict who would be out there."
The Rangers are coming off a home doubleheader split against Sheridan (26-6) on Monday at Cowboy Field. Laramie won the first game 12-6, aided by a nine-run second inning to snap the Trooper's 13-game winning streak. Sheridan bounced back to claim the second contest 13-2.
"(Sheridan) is a really good team. Offensively, we felt like in the first game it was nice to go out and get that win," Lozano said. "I told the guys in between the guys that I don't think we got Sheridan's best and be ready for game two.
"I don't know if we were ready for game two, but Sheridan sure was. But it was good to get a split against a good team."
For games played through last Sunday, the Gillette Roughriders (32-12, 8-0) are on top of the AA standings with an undefeated conference record. They are followed by the Cheyenne Sixers (31-4, 5-1), Sheridan, Laramie, Casper Oilers (14-13-1, 3-5), Jackson Giants (18-18, 0-4), Rock Springs Stallions (3-37, 0-4) and Evanston Outlaws (10-22, 0-6).
"We would like to be a little higher in the standings right now, but we still have six conference games ahead of us and time to make up some ground," Lozano said. "It's kind of the east vs. west and I think the east side of the state has proved itself this year with Sheridan, Gillette, Cheyenne and Laramie as the top four teams that still need to be reckoned with."
David Watson is the WyoSports assistant editor. He can be reached at dwatson@wyosports.net or 307-755-3327. Follow him on Twitter at @dwatsonsports.
