(Story by Stephen McDaniel)
After three innings, the Ankeny Centennial baseball team found itself clinging to a one-run lead over visiting Marshalltown on Saturday.
Then the Jaguars slammed the door shut.
Ninth-ranked Centennial piled on nine runs in the next three innings to bring the Class 4A substate quarterfinal to an early end with an 11-1 victory in six innings.
“It was a nice win,” said junior third baseman Will Morris. “I thought we started off a little slow, but we just went out there and tried to not think about the playoffs and if you lose, you’re done.”
Morris was the early spark of offense for Centennial and helped power the Jaguars past a slower start in the first few innings. He ended the night slugging a trio of standup doubles with all three contributing to three of the team’s first four runs of the game.
In the first inning, Morris hit his first double to give the Jaguars an early 1-0 lead. He doubled again in the third before ultimately scoring on an infield single by Jackson Reed.
Morris hit his third consecutive double in the fourth to put his team ahead, 4-1.
“I just wasn’t trying to do too much,” Morris said. “I know I’ve put in a lot of work, I just trusted myself and stayed confident.”
Centennial broke the game open with a four-run fifth inning to extend the margin to 8-1. Will Nesler contributed a two-run single in the outburst.
The Jaguars jumped at the chance to close things out in the sixth when Reed drilled an RBI triple to start another rally. He then scored on a grounder by Cade Newman.
Alex Cory got a grounder to roll past the first baseman for a single before eventually scoring on a passed ball a few batters later for the run-rule victory.
“I always think sometimes the first (substate) game is the hardest,” said Centennial coach Mark Hey. “It’s not necessarily that your opponent is the hardest, but it’s your feelings and the first time you’re playing a game with no guarantee you’ll come out to practice tomorrow. Sometimes players will play a little bit tight, especially if you’re playing a team that you think you should beat.”
One of the constants all game for Centennial was junior pitcher Trae Houser. He allowed a two-out double by Larrs Schoenfelder that tied the game in the top of the second, but responded by shutting down the Bobcats the rest of the way.
Houser (3-3) finished with a two-hitter. He walked one and had six strikeouts.
“Getting rained out on Friday changed our thinking because we would’ve had to keep Morris’ pitch count down for him to come back on Wednesday,” Hey said. “We have a lot of confidence in Trae, and we thought he’d get the job done. I was just really happy with how he threw. He located his fastball extremely well and mixed in his offspeed pitches just enough to keep them off balance.”
It was the 14th straight loss for Marshalltown, which finished the season at 6-27. The Bobcats lost for the 17th time by at least 10 runs.
Centennial (24-13) will now host a substate semifinal on Monday against Linn-Mar (Marion) (19-20) at 7 p.m. The winner will play at No. 6 Iowa City Liberty (31-9) in the substate final on Wednesday.
Linn-Mar advanced with a 7-3 win at Iowa City West.
“We’ve just got to play our game, play clean and have fun,” Morris said.
