(Story by Stephen McDaniel)
The 2025 baseball season hasn’t gotten off to the most ideal start for the Ankeny Hawks.
After having two different delays earlier in the week, the Hawks officially opened the year with an 0-2 record after falling 13-0 and 5-0 in a doubleheader against visiting Pleasant Valley on Thursday. The Spartans are No. 5 in the Class 4A preseason rankings.
“Tip of the cap to Pleasant Valley,” said Ankeny coach Joe Balvanz. “They came across the state on a Thursday afternoon, those guys shook the cobwebs off on the bus, and came out here and put together a tremendous doubleheader.”
The original plan was to open the season with a trip to reigning Class 3A champion North Polk on Monday, but weather canceled that matchup. Ankeny’s matchup with the Spartans was then moved back a day due to field conditions.
The Hawks struggled to get the bats going in both games, being limited to just seven total hits in the doubleheader.
A large part of those struggles came from having to face two of Pleasant Valley’s top returning pitchers in senior Lincoln Dalton and junior Bo Collingwood.
Dalton went the distance in the opener and allowed just four hits with two walks while striking out five batters in a 95-pitch outing.
Collingwood, a Blinn College commit, was even more dominant in the nightcap. He gave up just one hit and struck out 14 batters in 5 2/3 innings.
“What I told them in the huddle was that if you want to win a game in the state tournament, you’re going to have to beat someone like (Dalton or Collingwood),” Balvanz said. “At least we’ve seen it now and we can walk away. Even though it didn’t go our way, we can learn from it, adjust and get better.”
Ankeny was able to get two hits off Adam Bratcher in relief, but wasn’t able to put any runs on the board as the Hawks were shut out in back-to-back games.
Evan Irlmeier was the only Hawk to record multiple hits on the day. He had a double in the opener and a single in the second game.
Balvanz used nine different pitchers on the night, including six in the first game. Hunter Minner took the loss in the opener.
Junior Will Davies went 4 2/3 innings in the nightcap and had a pair of strikeouts. Ryan Buffington and Jackson Molloy took over the rest of the way to close things out.
One silver lining that the Hawks were able to pull out of their first two games was getting some valuable experience facing talented pitchers. With the months of June and July still ahead of them, they have more than enough time to iron out the wrinkles from the first few games, get pitch counts lower and get the bats going.
Opening up the season against a quality opponent will help the Hawks settle in as they prepare for conference action during the summer.
“There’s no nights off in the CIML,” Balvanz said. “So you may as well get used to playing night in, night out. There’s going to be an 8 or a 9 in the first digit on the radar gun and you’ve got to learn to be comfortable being uncomfortable, battle your at-bats and grind away.”
Ankeny has a chance to rebound from its season-opening losses when it heads to Cedar Rapids Kennedy for the Herkelman Invitational on Saturday. The Hawks are slated for matchups against Iowa City High (1-1) and No. 9 Cedar Rapids Kennedy (2-2).