The Wayne High softball team was in a pretty good place in the Class B power point standings heading into Monday’s B-6 subdistrict tournament at the Wayne Summer Sports Complex.
That all changed early Monday evening when the third-seeded Cardinals came from behind and scored three times in the bottom of the seventh to post a 6-5 win over the Blue Devils and earn an automatic trip to this weekend’s district finals.
Now the Blue Devils, 18-7, must sit and wait for the final update of wild card points to see if they’re playing in this weekend’s best-of-three district tournament and, more important, where.
“I don’t know at this point,” a disappointed coach Rob Sweetland said after the loss. “This doesn’t help because Crete was below us (in the power points). If the top six or seven teams win then we probably have a chance. It’s just a matter of how the math works out.”
The math was pretty easy for the Blue Devils in Monday’s tournament opener. They put up 12 runs in the first inning and everybody on the roster saw playing time as the Blue Devils smoked Schuyler, 17-0.
Twelve players got at least one hit for the Blue Devils, who sent 17 batters to the plate in the first inning and came away with the easy win.
Virginia Kniesche had the only extra-base hit of the game, hitting a double, and scored three times. Brooklyn Kruse, Taytum Sweetland and Hope O’Reilly each had two hits in the win. Mikaela McManigal scored twice and had three RBI’s, Sweetland added two RBI’s and Kruse had two runs scored.
Also recording hits in the first-round win were Aliah Schulz, Taytem Ellis, Caitlyn Mostek, Kendall Dorey, Liberty Titiml, Jersey Jensen and Rylin Hall. Logan Miller scored a run, Delaney Kruse drove in two and scored a run, and Miller, Mostek, Kierah Haase and Brianna Nissen scored runs.
Wayne jumped on Crete for three runs in the top of the first, thanks to RBI singles by Dorey, Sweetland and O’Reilly. They made it 5-1 in the third when Brooklyn Kruse doubled off the top of the fence, scoring Nissen, and O’Reilly brought Kruse home with an infield single.
The Blue Devils maintained a two-run advantage and could have added to the lead in the seventh, loading the bases before Sweetland popped out to end the threat.
Crete came through in their final at bat, recording five hits in the final frame, the last a bases-loaded single by Mackenzie Steuer to left center that gave Crete the come-from-behind win.
“The pressure is always on the visiting team there at the end, and we needed to put some more distance between us,” Sweetland said. “That fourth time through the lineup they kind of got on us a little bit and we didn’t. We had too many pop-ups and left too many runners out there when we had a chance to add to the lead, but you have to tip your cap to Crete because they got the hits when they needed to.”
So, for now, the Blue Devils sit and wait for the rest of Monday’s subdistrict results to post before they know their fate for this weekend’s district tournament, where the eight winners advance to next week’s state tournament in Hastings.
Sweetland said that a win might have put Wayne in position to host a district, but for now they’ll wait and see where they stand.
“Winning this might have gotten us a home game, which would have been a big help,” he said. “Not that we can’t go on the road and win, but the farther down you drop the tougher it gets because those top six teams are really good.”
