Cowboys, Whipple too much for Knights
SIDNEY - Leighton Whipple struck out 10 and his Sidney teammates took advantage of every opportunity they got in a 4-1 win over Fremont-Mills in the Class 1A, Substate 14 opener last Monday in Sidney.
Whipple fanned 10 in the complete game three-hitter and, according to Fremont-Mills coach Jake Brown, made nothing easy for his hitters.
“He threw a hell of game, he pounded the zone and he only threw 40 pitches through four or five innings,” Brown said. “We got a couple base runners on late and kind of made him work for it but in the end he did what he did to not only us early this season but what he did to everyone else he’s faced this year.”
Both teams finished with three hits but the Knights didn’t get on the board until the seventh inning when Brady Owen smacked his first home run of the season, a solo shot.
“Brady has such a compact swing and he got a hold of one last night and it finally went,” Brown said. “He’s been tearing the laces off the baseball all season and he finally got one. It wasn’t a shock to my assistant coach or myself. We’ve been waiting for it all year.”
Owen, Jake Malcom and Tyler Johnson had the Knights’ hits.
The Cowboys scored one run each in the first, third, fourth and sixth innings. Whipple and Cole Stenzel each drove in runs for the Cowboys but they could never seem to get in a groove against Johnson, the Knights’ starting pitcher.
Johnson fanned nine, scattered three hits and went out of the game only after reaching his 115 pitch limit after 6 2/3 innings.
“Tyler’s a warrior,” Brown said. “We didn’t really know what we were going to have pitching this year and he emerged as our No. 1 this year. He pitches his way.
“He struggled a little bit getting ahead in counts and he walked seven but they only scored four runs. He was still able to find the command to work around that and he only allowed three earned runs and struck out nine. He didn’t have his greatest command but he had enough warrior mentality to fight through it.”
Fremont-Mills finishes its season with a record of 5-11. Turning the page to next season, however, the Knights might be among the preseason Corner Conference favorites. They lose no seniors on a roster that hit .303 as a team and returns five pitchers who started at least two games this season.
“We started seven sophomores and two juniors for the majority of this season,” Brown said. “We’re a young team but with all those guys coming back next year and knowing what we have to work on, southwest Iowa hasn’t heard the last of Fremont-Mills and this group of baseball players.”