The Helias Crusaders had five baserunners in the first inning.
They had four in the next six.
“That’s just not having competitive at-bats,” Helias coach Chris Wyrick said Wednesday night after the Crusaders dropped an 11-3 decision to the Rock Bridge Bruins in Central Missouri Activities Conference action at the American Legion Post 5 Sports Complex.
“They made adjustments to what we were doing and we didn’t make the adjustments we needed to make, We talk about that all the time. Baseball is a game of adjustments, you have to be ready to adjust to what the other team is doing and we didn’t do that.”
In the top of the first, Rock Bridge had runners at first and second with one out before Helias turned a double play to end the inning.
Drew Miller led off the bottom of the inning with a single to center before Sam Wyrick singled to put runners at first and second. After a fielder’s choice got an out at third, Kase Winegar singled to center and when the ball scooted past the Rock Bridge center fielder, courtesy runner Landon King and David Hofherr scored to make it 2-0.
Ben Miller followed with a single to center to score Winegar to give the Crusaders a 3-0 lead.
“We were hunting what we were supposed to hunt,” Wyrick said.
The Bruins answered with three runs of their own in the top of the second. The inning started with a throwing error before Sam Wyrick retired the next two batters on a groundout and a strikeout.
Cullen Snow then walked to put runners at first and second before Bradley Morgan of the Bruins kept the inning alive with a bloop double down the right-field line to make it 3-2. Morgan then came around to score when Ty Thompson beat out an infield single deep in the hole at shortstop.
“That was huge,” Chris Wyrick said. “We didn’t accomplish what we wanted. If we put up a zero there, it’s huge. Not that they weren’t ever going to score some runs, but not that inning.”
The Bruins took the lead for good with a run in the fifth off Helias reliever Trey Rice. Andrew Hill led off with a single and was sacrificed to second before moving to third on a passed ball. After a walk, Hill came home to score on a fielder’s choice.
Rock Bridge then blew the game open with a six-run sixth inning. After the leadoff batter reached on an error, the Bruins had five hits and a walk in sending 10 batters to the plate.
The Bruins scored their final run in the seventh on two singles and two walks.
Rock Bridge finished with 14 hits in the game against three Helias pitchers. The first seven spots in the Bruin batting order each had five plate appearances in the game.
“They put some good swings on it, you can see it when they had 14 hits,” Wyrick said. “They fouled off tough pitches, they didn’t chase pitches out of the zone.
“We need to be even more competitive than we were to get them down in the count.”
Dane Gray got the win for the Bruins. He allowed six hits and one walk while striking out seven. Mark Brown struck out one in the seventh for Rock Bridge.
Sam Wyrick pitched the first four innings for the Crusaders, allowing three unearned runs on six hits and two walks. He struck out three before being taken out before the start of the fifth inning due to throwing 83 pitches.
Rice allowed seven runs (five earned) on six hits and a walk in 1⅓ innings of relief. He struck out two. King pitched the final 1⅔ innings, giving up a run on two hits and three walks while recording two strikeouts.
“Our pitchers need to be more efficient,” Wyrick said. “When we get people down 0-2 or 1-2 in the count, we have to finish them off. In my mind, that at-bat had better be over.
“We’ve had good pitching all season, but we need to get better at closing out hitters.”
The five unearned runs came on three Helias errors.
“Things we’ve gotten away with all year, we didn’t get away with today,” Wyrick said. “It caught up with us.
“If we can accept that and learn from it, it would be a positive from today.”
Six Crusaders had one hit each in the game.
Rock Bridge, ranked No. 4 in Class 6, is now 18-2 overall and 4-0 in the CMAC. It’s the first conference win this season for the Bruins not by run-rule.
Helias, ranked No. 2 in Class 5, is 12-4 and 0-2. The Crusaders will play two games Saturday in Cape Girardeau, facing Triad from Troy, Ill., at 12:30 p.m. and Cape Girardeau: Notre Dame at 3 p.m. The games will be played at Capaha Field, the home field of Southeast Missouri State University.
In Wednesday night’s JV game, Rock Bridge topped Helias 5-0. Three Crusaders had one hit each.