When the Class 4A substate baseball pairings are announced next week, fourth-ranked Southeast Polk will be among the CIML Conference teams that could earn a No. 1 seed.
But even if that happens, the Rams likely won’t want to see Ankeny in their bracket.
The Hawks got a brilliant pitching performance from sophomore Zach Halverson and posted a 5-1 victory on Thursday at Southeast Polk, completing a sweep of the season series. They earlier won both games of a doubleheader against the Rams on June 2.
“It was certainly nice to (win) all three of them against a team that I think pretty highly of,” said Ankeny coach Joe Balvanz. “They’ve got some good hitters, and they’re deep in arms. We’re just trying to play as well as we can, and this was easily our most complete effort of the season for seven innings.”
Halverson (1-1) outdueled Southeast Polk’s Carson Medina to earn his first varsity win. He allowed just two hits, walked two and had two strikeouts in a 96-pitch complete game.
The Hawks committed just one error behind Halverson.
“Zach worked ahead in the count, and the defense was routine and made some spot plays when they needed to,” Balvanz said. “When you get to Thursday and your pitching is a little thin, we needed an effort out of a sophomore and he went out there and I thought he pitched beyond his years. It was fun to see that out of him.
“I also thought Max (Watson) called a tremendous game. He’s really turning into a high-end catcher,” he added.
Medina, meanwhile, entered the game with a 5-0 record and a 0.72 ERA. On June 8, he tossed a three-hitter with nine strikeouts in a 5-1 win at No. 1 Ankeny Centennial, handing the Jaguars the first of their two losses this season.
On Thursday, Medina allowed three earned runs on five hits over the first five innings. He walked five and had just one strikeout before being replaced by Aaron Estell.
“He’s a good pitcher,” Balvanz said of Medina. “He had some command issues throughout the night. He had good stuff, but he was working behind hitters and we got ourselves into some advantageous counts.”
The Hawks took a 2-0 lead in the top of the second inning. Southeast Polk answered with an RBI double by Corbyn Medina in the bottom of the frame, but Ankeny then added two runs in the fourth and one more in the sixth.
Watson led the way, going 3-for-4 with a double and four RBIs. He has knocked in a team-high 20 runs on the season.
Reid Johnson went 2-for-3, and Carson Agan drove in a run. Karsten Bernholtz went 1-for-1 with two walks and scored a pair of runs.
“We had some really good quality at-bats, especially out of Max in some big-time spots,” Balvanz said.
The Hawks improved to 8-10 in the conference and 14-15 overall. Southeast Polk’s records dropped to 11-7 and 23-9.
Ankeny will host two games in the Brent Prange Classic on Saturday. The Hawks will face Carlisle (15-9) at 10 a.m. and Sioux City East (21-11) at 4:45 p.m.
