Wayne fell to Hartington and Pender to come away with a fourth-place finish in the Ralph Bishop League tournament.
In Thursday’s semifinal, Wayne and Hartington hooked up in a battle that ended on a walk-off play in the eighth to give Hartington a 5-4 win.
Playing at Hank Overin Field due to field issues at Hartington, Wayne got three in the second on two RBI singles and a Hartington error. Calvin Ankeny singled home Alex Rodriguez and came home on a two-out Zander Liston single. Liston would later score on a fielding error to give Wayne the 3-1 lead.
Hartington would get two in the bottom of the second to tie the game, but Rodriguez singled and came home on another Hartington error to make it 4-3.
Hartington tied it at 4-4 in the fourth and it settled into a pitcher’s battle after that. Rodriguez came on in relief of Garrett Anderson in the eighth, but Hartington loaded the bases and brought the winning run home on a hit batter to claim the win.
Anderson pitched an outstanding game, striking out 13 and walking two in six innings of work.
Jaxson Kneifl had two of Wayne’s six hits in the game. Rodriguez singled and scored twice and Parker Patefield also had a hit.
The Juniors let another one get away late in Saturday’s league consolation game at Eaton Field in Wakefield as Pender scored four in the fifth for a 7-5 win.
Wayne trailed 2-1 in the third when they put up three runs to take a 4-2 lead. Mason Heikes singled, scoring Drew Reinhardt, and a two-run double by Ankeny brought home Heikes and Anderson.
Wayne would add another run in the fourth on a Pender error that scored Austin Heiser, but Post 55 came back with four in the bottom of the fifth to come back for the win.
Patefield pitched four innings and struck out five, while Heikes pitched one inning and took the loss.
Heikes had two hits while Reinhardt, Ankeny and Patefield doubled. Reinhardt scored two runs and Ankeny had two RBIs.
Wayne closed the regular season at home Wednesday against Wisner. They begin play in the B-3 area tournament Friday at Valley.
