Tigers 3 @ Waconia 4 (Sunday, July 23)
The Tigers entered this battle without their # 3 hitter and veteran
catcher, Pat Schultz, who was off to his honeymoon after getting married
the day before. But as I’ve been telling Pat all year, he can’t
hit lefties anyway, so he wouldn’t have been in the lineup against
Laker southpaw Travis Van Doren (yeah, right).
The backdrop for this game turned out eerily similar. The Tigers lost 7-2 to Waconia on May 30, but on June 25, Mike Schultz lost at Waconia when he worked 8.1 innings, throwing 133 pitches as the Lakers rallied for two in the ninth to win, 4-3. On this night, Mike Schultz worked 8.1 innings and took the loss in the 9th, throwing 135 pitches.
The 135th pitch was Schultz’s last, as leadoff hitter Blaine Walstrom smoked a one-out, one-hop triple off the wall in right, just beating the relay throw ahead of third baseman Paul Dressen’s tag. Ryan Witt relieved, and fielded a hot comebacker to record the second out. But on his fourth pitch, 3-hitter Dan Chrest sent a single up the middle, ending the ballgame.
The Tigers took a 3-1 lead in the fourth, scoring
two runs on a fielder’s choice and an error on the same play,
which allowed Nate Hartmann and Shane Hofmann to both “come
on down”. In the fifth, the Lakers tied it up on a two-run double
by cleanup hitter Dana Hegman.
The Tigers failed to get down a couple of bunts, and also ran into
a tag on a double play, that could have led to a fourth run. But loser’s
remorse is always a game of “if’s”. It could also
be said that Mike Schultz – to his credit – pitched out
of several tough spots where the Lakers could have taken advantage.
Offensively, the Tigers scraped together only five hits off complete game victor Travis “Don’t Call Me Mimi” Van Doren, with Adam Hoffman and Matt Schultz leading the way with two apiece. Hoffman also drove in the Tigers’ first run with an RBI single in the third.
It should be noted that this game lasted approximately 2 hours, 14 minutes, and 8 seconds longer than Mike and Matt Schultz’s co-best man’s speech at their brother’s wedding on Saturday.
This page was created and maintained by Nick Kornder, Sports Information Director at Northern State University. The views and ideas on this page are that of the author, and not those of Northern State University.