GREAT BEND — All the weeks, the months, the years of hitting and fielding drills, long road trips, steadily getting better, were leading to this.
Crest High’s Lancers, who had been steamrolling their opponents all season, were three innings away from their primary objective Friday, a chance to play for a state championship.
But baseball has a funny way of laying waste to the best-laid plans.
In a span of a half inning, Crest’s 6-1 lead over Little River in the Class 2-1A state semifinal evaporated.
Lancer head coach Roland Weir put it succinctly: “The wheels fell off. We picked the absolute worst time to play our worst. We just couldn’t make the plays we needed.”
The Redskins rallied to knot the score at 6-6 in the top of the fifth.
A bit shell-shocked, but no less determined, Crest had an answer, plating a go-ahead run in the bottom of the fifth to take a 7-6 lead.
But another Little River run in the top of the sixth tied the score. A scoreless seventh inning put the game into extra innings, where the Redskins erupted for three runs and a 10-7 lead in the top of the eighth.
Was this the end of the line?
Not so fast, my friend.
The Lancers loaded the bases with nobody out, suddenly putting a charge in the sizable contingent of Crest fans who had flocked to the Great Bend Sports Center. Holden Barker closed the gap to 10-8 with an RBI grounder, putting the tying runs in scoring position.
But that tying hit never came. Little River’s pitchers retired the final two Lancer batters, ending Crest’s state title bid with a 10-8 victory.
“It was a tough game,” Weir said. “I take a share of the blame with this, too. We’re all a part of this team.”
Still stinging from the defeat, Crest took the field later afternoon in the third-place game against Valley Falls.
“But I don’t think we had recovered mentally,” Weir said.
Valley Falls broke a scoreless deadlock with a five-run third inning and eventually led 11-0 into the fifth inning.
