Garden City Baseball Sweeps Liberal On Buffs Senior Day
Garden City, KS (westernkansasnews.com) Garden City High School Baseball Coach Bill Wilson knows his team has had trouble limiting the big inning this year. Not only did his team limit the big inning in sweeping Saturday’s doubleheader of Liberal 7-3 and 10-4, his Buffaloes came up with a couple big innings of their own and sent nine seniors out on a high note during Senior Day at Clint Lightner Field.
For the Buffaloes(6-9, 3-5 WAC) in game one their big inning came late in the game. Garden City scored their first run on a wild pitch from Redskins starting pitcher Collin Ware to get the early 1-0 lead. GC added another run in the second on a throwing error from last year’s all-conference shortstop Jared Hasik. Thomas Solorio added a RBI single to make 3-0 Garden City in the fifth.
If there was one thing that plagued Liberal (9-7, 1-3 WAC) all day it had to be leaving guys on base. The Redskins left 11 on in the first game and 19 in the doubleheader. Garden City starting pitcher Daniel Flores was able to duck his way through several jams in route to the win. Flores gave up one earned run and four hits, walking six and striking out three. Liberal finally cracked through for their first run of the game in the sixth to make it 3-1 GC on a RBI single from ninth spot batter Lorenzo Pando.
The Buffaloes broke open the game in the sixth scoring four runs. Eden Arreola smacked a two run single to left and Mitch Hernandez knocked in a run off Redskin reliever Jared Fox. Ware deserved a better fate on the mound. He surrendered seven runs, but only two were earned and only allowed five hits while walking two. Liberal added two runs in the seventh off Buffaloes reliever Griffin Brunsen, but they still fell short losing 7-3.
Game One Highlights
Game two saw Liberal break on top early with a RBI double off Jared Hasik. That would be the only run Mario Montoya would give up in his six innings on the mound for Garden City. The Buffaloes teed off on Hasik early scoring five off Liberal’s starter. Solorio had a RBI double, Zapata RBI single where a second runner scored on the play because of a throwing error by Sylman Pando. Montoya also knocked in a run with double to rightfield. Zapata single over second baseman’s Lorenzo Pando’s leap in the second to make it 6-1 Garden City.
Garden City scored an unearned run in the fourth and had a double steal of home by Rivas in the sixth coupled with RBI singles from Solorio and Montoya to lead 10-1. Liberal attempted a comeback in the top of the 7th in scoring three times, but the game ended with a relay that cut down the second runner to score on Kaiden Long’s fly to left that was dropped by Irvy Hernandez. After Hernandez dropped the ball, he fired in towards Griffin Brunson and Brunson fired in towards home to tag out Law Greiner. The defensive play helped Ivan Gutierrez end the game despite a rocky relief appearance in the seventh that gave up three runs.
Game Two Highlights
Garden City will head to Emporia next Friday and play games against Andover Central and Winfield Saturday. Liberal still has a pair of conference doubleheaders to play at home against Dodge City and Hays.
