With a busy home schedule on the docket, Wayne High baseball made the roughly 40 mile trek to West Point for a northeast Nebraska showdown to open the week.
From Anderson Field at Neligh Park in West Point, the Blue Devils visited the co-op of Guardian Angels Central Catholic/West Point-Beemer on Monday.
Despite striking out 13 times, the Wayne High baseball team remained focused on the end goal and rallied late to win 4-3. The Blue Devils are now 7-4 on the season while the host Patriots fell to 3-6.
The game was originally scheduled to be played in Wayne but was moved to West Point and also marked the lone meeting of the regular season the two teams will play each other.
Both pitchers were in the zone the opening three and a half innings with Wayne being held to two hits and a no-hitter going into the bottom of the fourth against GACC/West Point-Beemer. Scoring began when the host Patriots drove in the first run of the game during the home half of the fourth producing four hits.
Following a scoreless fifth, GACC/West Point-Beemer added two insurance runs to go up 3-0 after six innings.
Down to their final out with two runners aboard, the Wayne bats came alive posting a four-run top of the seventh inning thanks to four hits forcing the home half of the seventh up 4-3. Sophomore Adrian Contreras started the scoring with a RBI double driving in sophomore William Patefield, sophomore Jaxson Kneifl followed with a RBI base hit scoring junior Parker Patefield before closing with a two-RBI base hit from senior Alex Rodriguez bringing in Contreras and Kneifl.
In the home half of the seventh, the Patriots had the bases loaded with two outs when Kneifl fielded a hard hit ground ball at short making the game-ending play with a toss to Rodriguez at second base.
Final favored Wayne High winning 4-3 with both teams recording seven hits. Wayne committed the lone error of the game.
Alex Rodriguez singled twice and drove in two runs; Adrian Contreras doubled, drove in a run and scored as Jaxson Kneifl singled, drove in a run and scored. Senior Calvin Ankeny also singled twice.
William Patefield singled and scored as Parker Patefield scored.
Junior Brodrick Tiedtke (97 pitches) picked up the complete game victory allowing three earned runs off seven hits while striking out four batters, walking three and hitting one.
Logan Rolf (101 pitches) started the game for the Patriots and recorded 11 strikeouts with two walks while allowing an earned run off four hits in six and a third innings after being pulled with one on and one out in the top of the seventh. Colby Anderson (17) suffered the loss in the final two-thirds allowing three earned runs off three hits while striking out and walking two batters each.
