Bottom Falls Out for Struggling Saints Baseball

Seward’s baseball team capped off their regular season with another sweep.  Garden City swept Seward Thursday and Friday at Williams Stadium in Garden City.  GCCC won Friday 2-0 and 10-7 after beating the Saints 4-2 and 25-2 on Thursday.  It’s the third time the Saints have been swept this season in a four game series and the fourth time in program history.

The Saints wasted a solid outing by Brian Tims in game one Friday in a 2-0 loss.  Tims pitched a complete game.  But Seward only had five hits.

In game two, SCCC took a 2-0 lead in the second after Jacob Nielsen and Addison Kaasch singled to lead off the inning.  The Broncbusters scored two in the third, two in the fourth, and five in the sixth to lead 9-3.  Seward had scored in the sixth when Trent Powell singled home a run.  The Saints added two in the seventh as Tims singled home two.  Seward loaded the bases with no outs in the ninth and scored two runs as the rain was falling.

Seward finishes the regular season 17-36 and 10-22 in the Jayhawk West and will likely finish in 8th out of nine teams.  They will play the Jayhawk East champ in the best two out of three series on the road next weekend.

Here is Roy Allen’s article of Thursday’s games.

If the Seward County Saints could summon Will Smith and his Neuralyzer from Men in Black after Thursday’s games at Garden City, they certainly would have, as Seward suffered a 4-2 walk off loss in game one of the doubleheader and were then handed their worst loss in program history in game two in a 25-2 thumping to drop all the way back to 10-20 in Jayhawk West Conference play this season.

Back to back 1st inning doubles for Garden City put the Busters on the board and gave the home team an early 1-0 advantage.

It remained a 1-0 game to the 4th when Seward cracked the scoreboard for the first time, using a two out Garden error and an RBI single behind that from Montana Newell to give themselves a 2-1 lead.

After two quick outs for the Saints in the bottom of the 4th, the Busters mounted a rally, getting two straight singles and then a wild pitch and a passed ball to push the tying run across to knot things at 2.

The Saints put two on with one out in the 5th for the middle of their lineup, but back to back pop outs on the infield killed their chances to retake the lead. In the 6th they got a leadoff single from Jacob Nielsen and moved him to second on a sacrifice bunt, but two groundouts ended the frame with the score still tied at two.

Garden threatened in the 6th, loading the bases without hitting the ball out of the infield, but Saints starter Jared Biddy worked out of the mess and kept the score knotted at two to the 7th.

The Saints got their leadoff man on again in the 7th as Law Greiner was hit by a pitch, but a failed sacrifice attempt, a fly out, and a strikeout again forced Seward to settle for a goose egg in the inning.

Garden City worked a leadoff walk of their own to begin the bottom of the 7th and after a groundout, the Busters used the breeze blowing out to left for a deep two run home run, effectively ending the game in a 4-2 Garden City walk off win.

The Saints actually outhit the Busters 8-7 in the contest, but couldn’t get the big hit as Newell finished with the only hit with a runner in scoring position in the contest. Biddy took the loss, falling to 4-6 on the year as he allowed seven hits and four runs, three earned, while striking out eight in the complete game effort.

SEWARD COUNTY/GARDEN CITY GAME ONE BOX SCORE<http://www.sewardsaints.com/sports/bsb/2016-17/boxscores/20170427_161d.xml>

In game two it was again Garden jumping out to an early lead as the Busters got a two run home run in the bottom of the 2nd to go ahead 2-0.

The Saints answered though, using their patience to score a pair of runs in the top half of the 3rd on a bases loaded walk and a double play ball to even the score at 2-2.

A Seward error allowed the Busters to get going again in their half of the 3rd as Garden got a one out double and a two run single behind that to retake the lead at 5-2.

All heck broke loose for the Saints in the Garden half of the 4th. After getting a strikeout to start the inning, the Saints would watch as six straight Busters reached base, pushing across three more runs to make it 8-2. After finally recording the second out of the inning, Garden just stood at the plate and let Saints pitching walk the next four batters, three of them with the bases loaded to make it 11-2 before putting the exclamation point on the inning with a grand slam to stretch their lead to 15-2.

It was more of the same in the 5th as an RBI single for the Busters made it a 16-2 game and Garden City’s second grand slam in as many innings gave them a 20-2 lead.

Things continued to snowball for Seward in the 6th as Garden City continued to add to their already gigantic lead. A solo home run followed by three consecutive two out hits put five more on the board for the home team to make it a 25-2 game after six.

The Saints went down in order in the 7th and mercifully the game finally came to an end with the run rule in a 25-2 victory for the Busters which marked the worst loss in Seward County Baseball history.

Garden City finished with more home runs in the game, four, than the Saints did hits, three. The Busters pounded out 20 hits against Seward pitching while the Saints made five errors on the defensive end. Errett Edwards had one of the Saints three hits and walked twice to reach base in three of his four at bats. Ethan Earhart took the loss on the mound for Seward, allowing six hits and five runs in 2 1/3 innings to fall to 3-5 on the year. Three Seward relievers combined to allow 20 runs in just 3 2/3 innings of work out of the bullpen.

SEWARD COUNTY/GARDEN CITY GAME TWO BOX SCORE<http://www.sewardsaints.com/sports/bsb/2016-17/boxscores/20170427_89a6.xml>

Roy Allen