WESTPHALIA, Mo. - It was the best of both worlds for the Fatima baseball team Thursday - not only did the Comets get timely hitting, but they got it from the bottom of their order.
On a night where the Comets came up with just five hits, they got three of them in the game's decisive fourth inning, scoring a pair of runs to jump-start a 3-2 win against the Blair Oaks Falcons.
Trailing 2-1 heading to the bottom of the fourth, the Comets got a pinch-hit, run-scoring single from Colby Luebbert in the 8 spot to drive in Sam Hager with the tying run. Fatima then got what turned out to be the winning run when No. 9 hitter Austin Schubert laced a single to score Matt Temmen.
"If you can get that production out of the bottom of the lineup, you're going to win ball games," Fatima coach Scott Kilgore said.
It was the second win in a week for Fatima (9-3) against Blair Oaks (5-10), as the Comets beat the Falcons by a 5-0 score April 10 in the opening round of the Capital City Invitational.
"Our record is not very pretty to look at right now, but it's about making progress and figuring things our and being where we want to be come the first of May," Blair Oaks coach Harv Antle said. "We'd like to think we'll have a third shot at these guys come (districts). We came into their park, the defending district champs, and proved we can play with them."
The singles broke up what had been a sacrifice fly contest early on.
The Falcons scored the game's first run in the top of the first when Jordan Hair led off with a single, went to second on a single by Adam Schell, moved to third on a passed ball and scored on a sac fly by Brent Heckemeyer.
The Comets tied it in the bottom of the first when Jared Schulte got hit by a pitch, stole second, went to third on an error and came home on Zach Hudspeth's sac fly.
The Falcons got their final run on another sac fly in the top of the fourth. James Reinkemeyer singled and went to second on a sacrifice bunt by Dylan Hoelscher. Cole Stockman then came on a pinch runner for Reinkemeyer and moved to third on a wild pitch before coming home on a sac fly by Dalton Fifer.
The Comets then won it in the bottom half of that frame.
"It would have been nice to scratch across a few more runs, but that's baseball. It doesn't always go your way," Kilgore said. "I still don't think we're firing on all cylinders yet, especially offensively.
"That was my focus with my (postgame) speech - "Let's get over to the cage and continue to work. Work on taking the ball up the middle, the other way, not just going through the routine.' ... I still feel we have a tremendous amount of potential and we can get to that next level."
Antle said Fatima's two-run bottom of the fourth very nearly didn't happen.
"We were one pitch away from getting out of it," he said. "We missed a location and the guy got a hit to center and the lead got away from us. We were able to work out of it after that ... and we were only chasing one run. Unfortunately for us, it proved to be too much."
Blair Oaks' Dalton Fifer had two hits and one RBI and was one of just two players in the game with multiple hits, as Schell chipped in with two singles.
In a unique twist, each team used four pitchers in the seven-inning contest, although for very different reasons. With the Falcons in the midst of a stretch where they could play as many as 10 games in nine days, they were looking to spread out the work load. And with the Comets not playing again until Monday at Fulton, the contest amounted to between-game bullpen sessions for some of the hurlers.
Brady Weavers started and pitched two innings for the Comets, giving up one earned runs three hits and two walks while striking out two. Logan Vogel got the win while working the next two, allowing one earned runs no one hit while striking out two.
Hager pitched the next two frame, scattering three hits, before Will Robertson got the save by pitching a scoreless seventh with one hit and one strikeout.
"I thought Brady did a great job and the two in the middle did well, they're capable of that and we know that," Kilgore said. "Then Will came in and closed it out. He looked really sharp."
Alec Sieg worked the first three innings for Blair Oaks and allowed just one unearned run on one hit and one walk with one strikeout.
Jacob Wilbers took the loss in relief, as he pitched the next two-thirds of an inning and gave up two earned runs on three hits and three walks.
Austin Herigon pitched the following 11/3 scoreless innings, allowing one hit and walking one to go with one strikeout. Jason Rackers struck out two in a hitless final inning.
"Other than the scoreboard, we played well," Antle said. "I was pleased with our performance. ... It was a good high-school ball game with two competitive teams that know each other very well. That was a step in the right direction for us."