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Griffons thwart Beejays, take third in Jayhawk League
The Nevada Griffons earned another win over the Liberal Beejays in the final game of the series at Lyons Stadium last night.
With the help of some good defensive play and poor base running by Liberal, Matt Speake faced only one over the minimum in the first inning. Speake allowed one walk and one hit in the inning, but was able to come out of the frame with no damage.
The Griffons were in danger of going down in order in the bottom half until Korby Mintken was able to work a two-out walk out of Beejays starter Brett Davis. Dan Ward followed with a looping fly ball that went into shallow right and dropped between three Liberal players, apparently struggling to see the ball in the air.
That gave the Griffons runners on first and third with two out, but they were unable to score.
Speake recorded his second and third strikeouts of the game in the top of the second, on his way to another scoreless inning. Davis got a bit rocky in the bottom half, hitting Tommy Fitzgerald to start the inning, followed by a double to the alley in right center by Mark Wyatt that allowed Fitzgerald to score from first.
Taylor House followed with a single to shallow right center, giving the Griffons runners on first and third, still with no outs in the inning. Nevada was able to tack on one more run, taking a 2-0 lead into the third.
Speake's dominance on the mound continued into the third, keeping the high-powered Liberal offense off the scoreboard again. The Griffons were able to add another hit to their total in the bottom of the frame, but were unable to score, keeping the game steady at 2-0.
Speake put the Beejays down in order in the fourth, adding two more strikeouts to his total and looking nearly flawless.
The Griffons got their lead-off man on in the bottom of the fourth thanks to a throwing error by the third baseman and followed with a bunt single, giving them runners on first and second with nobody out. Even with the benefit of two hits and an error in the inning, Nevada came up empty, still holding a 2-0 lead.
Speake looked to be starting to wear down in the fifth, but was still able to get out of the inning with no damage. He allowed one hit in the inning, but was able to get out of the inning facing just one over the minimum once again thanks to a tremendous defensive play by Fitzgerald.
Nevada was able to get to Davis again in the home half of the frame, touching the Beejays starter for two doubles and one run in the inning before getting Davis out of the game. Bren Schuehler came on to pitch with one out in the fifth and allowed one more run before closing out the inning, sending the game into the sixth with the Griffons up 4-0.
Speake's control looked a bit off in the sixth as he gave up a lead-off walk, but the runner was caught stealing later in the inning. The Griffons put together some solid defense to close out the inning and kept the Beejays off the scoreboard.
Mintken worked another two-out walk in the bottom of the sixth to keep Nevada from going down in order and later went on to steal second before coming around to score on an RBI double by Dan Ward. Play had to be stopped briefly when Julien Pollard got a bad bounce on the throw back to the infield and was hit in the nose by the ball, forcing him back to the dugout.
Eric Johnston came into the game to play right field, Mike Ferraro went to first and Bryce Baugh moved over to second. After the defensive shifts were made to replace Pollard, Trevor Geist was quickly retired to end the inning, sending the game into the top of the seventh with the Griffons up 5-0.
Speake struggled mightily in the seventh, giving up a one-out double, followed by a two-run home run by Jeremiah Sammy. Brent Lamaster came on in relief with one out in the seventh and allowed one hit, but was able to close out the inning with no further damage.
Will Skelton came on to pitch the seventh for the Beejays and gave up a two-out single to House. That was the only hit of the inning, taking the game into the eighth with Nevada up 5-2.
Lamaster started the eighth with strikeouts of the first two batters to come to the plate. Lamaster did give up one hit in the inning -- a two-out double by Steven Tucker -- but was able to retire the side without allowing a run when he struck out his third batter of the inning.
Alex Richard took the mound in the bottom of the eighth for Liberal and shut the Griffons' offense down completely, retiring all three batters to see the plate in the inning.
Lamaster got shaken briefly when Liberal third baseman Chris Kersten took one of his pitches deep to left. House was able to get under the ball for the first out of the inning and Lamaster quickly followed by putting Sammy on by hitting him with a pitch.
Lamaster recovered quickly, retiring the next two hitters by strikeout to give Nevada a 5-2 victory. "Brent just looked so good in the eighth, we couldn't take him out," Griffons head coach John Hill III said of his reliever.
After the game, Hill pointed out that the Griffons' pitching staff had been severely depleted, recently losing four pitchers for various reasons ranging from Drew Graham simply quitting the team to another pitcher losing a high school friend in a car accident. "Speake pitched with the true heart of a champion," Hill said of his starter, who came into the game on short rest.
This win bumps the Griffons up to third place in the Jayhawk League standings with a record of 16-12 in league play. The Griffons will have the next two nights off, with their next contest coming Saturday night against Southwest Elite on Saturday at Lyons Stadium.