The Ankeny Christian Academy baseball players didn’t overlook their first opponent in district play, even though the Eagles had routed Mormon Trail twice during the regular season.
Anthony Abbas went 3-for-4, scored two runs and drove in three more to lead ACA to a 21-0 victory over the Saints in four innings in a Class 1A district quarterfinal on Monday at North Polk Middle School. The game was postponed from Friday due to heavy rains.
“We take every game with pride, and we respect every team we play,” said Abbas.
It was the seventh consecutive win for the Eagles (26-5), who advanced to Tuesday’s district semifinal against Madrid (11-17). Mormon Trail finished the season at 0-18, which included earlier 30-0 and 15-0 losses to ACA.
“You always get a little antsy starting the playoffs, and you saw that with (Lucas) Erickson,” said ACA coach Konrad Christensen. “He hadn’t pitched in awhile because of his shoulder, and you wonder if he’s going to find the zone. But I kind of wanted to save all of my pitching for (Tuesday).”
Erickson (6-1) faced only four batters before departing after throwing just 20 pitches. He was replaced on the mound by Conner Crosby after the Eagles sent 11 batters to the plate and scored seven runs in the bottom of the first inning.
Erickson, Crosby and Noah Huckaby combined on a one-hitter. The trio recorded four strikeouts.
Erickson, the Eagles’ No. 6 hitter, went 2-for-2 and scored three runs. He hit an RBI double in the first inning, walked twice in his team’s six-run second inning, and then added an RBI single in an eight-run third.
“It was the same as the playoffs last year,” Christensen said. “The bottom of the lineup did such an amazing job. Unlike any other ACA team, just up and down the lineup you never know who is going to hit for you. There’s a lot of bat to ball.”
Nobody did more damage than Abbas, ACA’s No. 9 hitter. The sophomore singled in each of his first three at-bats to raise his average to .389.
“It feels really good to show that our whole lineup can do the job at the right time,” Abbas said. “That’s what we did.”
Andrew Mora went 2-for-3 with two walks and an RBI. Tyson Fincham and Austin Kimberley each had a two-run single.
The Eagles finished with 10 hits, but also capitalized on 12 walks, four hit batters and seven Mormon Trail errors. They added eight stolen bases, three of them by eighth grader Maddox Curtis.
Tuesday’s game will also be played at North Polk Middle School at 7 p.m. Madrid advanced with a 5-2 win over Collins-Maxwell on the same field.
The Tigers are expected to start junior Emerson Bridgewater, who boasts a 2-4 record with a 1.44 ERA. As a freshman, he pitched well in a 5-3 loss to ACA in a district semifinal.
“They’ve got their No. 2 guy ready for us,” Christensen said. “But we scouted them tonight, and we’ll have a plan. It’s going to be a dogfight. He’s a strikeout pitcher, so we’ve got to pick our pitches and make him work. We’ve got to be ready.”
