No. 1-ranked Mankato East showed its veteran presence Saturday at Johnson Park as the Cougars scored four runs in the bottom of the sixth to get past a pesky St. Peter outfit 9-5 in a Section 2AAA semifinal game.
East (19-3) trailed 3-2 and 5-4 before a wild pitch produced a run in the fifth to tie things. After Cougars’ left-hander Keaton Wojcik came in to work a 1-2-3 sixth frame, junior center fielder Carson Hart’s bouncer through the hole ignited the game-winning surge. Senior DH Caden Hansen smacked a two-run double down the left-field line before Wojcik, making his first varsity plate appearance, lined a two-run single up the middle.
“St. Peter is definitely a sleeper in the tournament right now,” Wojcik said. “They’re way better than their record or anybody says and it showed. They were really testing our defense and what we could do on the mound. In the end, we came through. Ideally we would have had our starting pitcher (Nathan Bridger) go the whole game but it kind of got away from us.
“I threw my fastball early in the count to get ahead of them because they were patient hitters. I felt good on the mound and I am a pitcher only, so getting my first varsity hit in my first at-bat was pretty epic too. I was going to take until two strikes and then swing at whatever they gave me.”
East tallied an unearned run in the first before senior Caeden Willaert’s leadoff single in the third helped produce another run. St Peter, which doesn’t have a single senior on its roster, took advantage of a three-base throwing error to put up a three-spot in the fourth. Losing pitcher Alex Korir got things going by slicing a double into the left-center field gap off Cougars’ starter Nathan Bridger.
Junior second baseman Mason Diede and senior left fielder Jack Hansen belted run-scoring doubles as the Cougars regained the lead in the fourth. After the Saints (14-6) used singles from Ryan Moelter and Korir to move in front 5-4, East got a run without a base hit to tie things. Korir led the Saints with two hits while Willaert was the lone East player to do the same.
“Our guys have been working hard all year. Where we are now compared to two months ago is night and day,” St. Peter coach Kurt Moelter said. “It’s all because of our work ethic so it’s exciting we get to play another game. We played the small game well and offensively we battled against some very good arms.”
East, which banged out eight hits and left eight runners on base, turned a 6-4-3 double play to end the game after Wojcik hit a batter. Wojcik didn’t allow a hit over two innings, striking out one and getting a trio of ground ball outs.
“They were scrappy and didn’t go down on strikes too often,” East coach Micah Degner said. “They were putting the ball in play or fouling pitches off. They also took advantage of our mistakes. We haven’t been in a situation where we’ve been down lately so it was a good experience for us to have to fight back to get the win.”
Caden Hansen, coming off an ACL injury, delivered the game’s biggest hit.
“They walked (Zach) Bosse ahead of me so I felt it was my time to make something happen,” he said. “They were throwing me inside fastballs so I made an adjustment to wind up later and it fell in down the line. I tripped up a little bit near second base but it was awesome. … A top-ten moment in my life that’s for sure.”
Willaert, who started the game-ending double play and pitched one inning, said the Saints were no slouch.
“They’re a lot better than people expect and they had a pitcher that went out and did his job,” he said. “We just kept on going until we get the job done. The energy on this team is awesome. Everybody wants to be here and everybody wants to win. … Everyone has the same goal and we have a lot of fun.”
East faces Mankato West (15-5) in Tuesday’s 5 p.m. winner’s bracket final at Johnson Park.