The second inning was a costly inning for the Blair Oaks Falcons.
The Hickman Kewpies sent 11 batters to the plate in the inning, scoring all seven of their runs in the frame to beat the Falcons 7-4 on Saturday morning at Vivion Field in the third-place game of the Capital City Invitational.
"One inning beat us," Blair Oaks coach Travis Henke said. "We chipped away. Hat's off to our guys for battling and trying to chip away, but Hickman's a very good ball club."
Hickman tallied seven of its 14 hits in the inning, including four consecutive doubles, off Blair Oaks pitcher Parker Bax. The Kewpies led 7-2 after two innings.
"Parker's a sophomore, he's got a little learning to do yet," Henke said. "I thought he threw well in the first inning, but then he just started trying to throw the ball and guide it instead of pitching. That's something we have to teach him now."
Ethan Rackers relieved Bax in the third inning and pitched four scoreless frames, scattering six hits and striking out one.
"That's what we asked him to do," Henke said. "Keep it close, keep them at seven and you never know what we can do with our offense."
The Blair Oaks offense scored in every inning through the first four innings, but never more than one run per inning. Mason Gipe hit a sacrifice fly in the first inning and Thomas Verslues scored on an error in the second to give the Falcons a 2-0 lead against Hickman, which is ranked No. 6 in Class 5.
After Hickman took the lead, Blair Oaks got another run in the third off an RBI double down the left-field line by Verslues. Gipe then drove in his second run of the day with a two-out RBI single in the fourth to make it a three-run game.
However, the Falcons stranded at least two runs on base in each of the first five innings, 11 total for the game. Henke said his team just couldn't find a way to put up a crooked number.
"We never had that big hit," he said. "We always had runners in scoring position, it seemed like, and we could never get one hit to get two guys across (the plate)."
Hickman also committed six errors in the first four innings. An error with two outs in each of the third and fourth innings gave Blair Oaks a chance to tack on unearned runs, but the Falcons failed to capitalized on three Kewpie errors in the second.
"We just didn't take advantage of the errors," Henke said. "We scored a few (runs) off of them, but we never took complete advantage and get a few runs off them.
"They capitalized off some of our misfortunes and that's how it works."
Blair Oaks had a scary moment in the sixth inning. Designated hitter Garrett Welschmeyer attempted to beat out an infield single and fell to the ground after he reached first base, grabbing his right knee.
Welschmeyer, who suffered a right ACL injury late in the football season, had to be helped off the field, but he was walking without assistance after the game.
"I think it scared him more than anything," Henke said. "Nothing's wrong right now."
Jason Rackers had the only multi-hit game for Blair Oaks, going 3-for-4 with three singles. Five other Falcons had one hit.
Anthony Hansen and Reid Wilson each went 3-for-4 to lead Hickman. Hansen had two doubles and one single, while Wilson had two singles, one double and one RBI. Dakota Solomon also had one double and two RBI.
Nick King was the winning pitcher, walking two and striking out four in five innings.
"It's a great tournament, great competition all around," Henke said. "You can't beat it."
It will be a quick turnaround for Blair Oaks (6-2), which hosts Fulton (4-4), ranked No. 9 in Class 4, on Monday.
"One bad thing about tournaments is you use up all your pitching, and when you schedule a game on Monday, you never know what you're going to do," Henke said. "We've got to find some pitching for us on Monday and see if we can come out and get a win."
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