The Ankeny baseball team rallied for two runs in the bottom of the seventh inning to earn its first win of the season on Saturday.
Ryan Wille hit a walk-off single to give the Hawks a 5-4 victory over Dubuque Hempstead in a game played at Cedar Rapids Xavier. Wille went 3-for-4 and drove in two runs.
“We had some good at-bats, ran the bases a lot better and were able to scratch across a couple of runs to win it,” said Ankeny coach Joe Balvanz, whose team is now 1-4. “It was good to see the response.”
Hempstead (2-4) jumped out to an early 3-0 lead before Ankeny tied it on a three-run homer in the fourth inning by Ryan Buffington, who went 2-for-2 at the plate.
“Ryan has been hitting the ball well,” Balvanz said. “He drove a ball the opposite way down the left-field line to tie it up.”
Ankeny reliever Brayden Kern gave up a run in the fifth inning, but then shut down the Mustangs until the seventh, when Hunter Minner (1-1) came in and got three outs to earn the win. Kern allowed just two hits and had four strikeouts over 2 2/3 innings.
“Paxton Wylie was effective in his start, and then Kern came in and was outstanding,” Balvanz said. “It would have been easy to get down on ourselves when we fell behind, but I thought the resilience we showed was a step in the right direction.”
Kobe Behrens went 2-for-4 and scored a run for the Hawks. Ace Parton also had a hit, his fourth of the day.
Earlier, Parton went 3-for-3 with a double in Ankeny’s 11-2 loss at Cedar Rapids Kennedy. Wille knocked in both of the Hawks’ runs in the third inning, while Drake Allison had a double.
Easton Lowe went 1-for-3 and scored a run, but then sat out the game against Hempstead.
“He got a little dinged up in that first game and hopefully he’ll feel better after a couple of days off because he’s a good leader for us,” Balvanz said.
Buffington (0-1) took the loss. He allowed four earned runs on six hits and had six strikeouts over the first three innings.
The Cougars (3-2) were led by Daniel Doyle, who went 4-for-4 with a home run, a triple and three RBIs. Ty Donels went 2-for-3 with a double and had two RBIs.
Donels was also the winning pitcher. He scattered five hits over the first five innings.
“We weren’t real sharp in game one,” Balvanz said. “I think we made four errors in that game, and a couple of them were just mental mistakes. I challenged the guys a little bit between games to clean that stuff up. I do see tremendous potential in this group. They just need to be more consistent.”
Ankeny will travel to Johnston on Wednesday for its CIML Conference opener against the Dragons (0-2).