The Raider baseball team finished the regular season at 5-15 overall, 3-13 in the conference which put them in eighth place, and 1-4 in the section which gave them the sixth seed for the section tournament thanks to two losses in the last two regular season games. On May 19, the Raiders travelled to Apple Valley to take on the Eagles in section competition, dropping that game 2-0. Eastview was next on the schedule for May 20, but Mother Nature forced a postponement, and the game took place on May 22. Hastings fell to the Lightning 6-3 to close the regular season.
At Apple Valley
The game at Apple Valley was a bit of a snoozefest offensively with a total of six hits between the two teams. Cole Karnick started on the mound for Hastings going five innings allowing two runs on three hits while walking and striking out five. Carter Lundstrom pitched the final inning striking out two. Gunnar Skov and Lukas Niederkorn logged the two Raider hits in the 2-0 loss.
Eastview
The other Apple Valley team took the trip to Hastings after a couple days of rain and the Lightning shocked the Raiders into submission. Hastings took the early 1-0 lead when Gunnar Skov brought the thunder, launching a solo homerun over the right field fence.
Eastview tied the game in the top of the second then took the lead in the top of the seventh, 2-1. Colton McKnight led off the bottom of the seventh and flew out to center field. Karnick followed that up with a single to put the tying run at first. A sacrifice bunt down the third base line from Marlowe Strain advanced Karnick to third. With two outs, Austin Viall came to the plate, and he drilled a grounder to short stop which was misplayed. The error put Viall on first and scored Karnick from third to tie the game 2-2 and forcing extra innings.
In the top of the eighth, Hastings logged two quick outs and looked to be shutting down Eastview. A series of unfortunate events were kicked off by a two-out error. Six straight Lightning players reached base resulting in four runs for Eastview.
Hastings faced a 6-2 deficit and two walks to start the bottom of the eighth and a walk to load the bases with one out gave the Raiders a glimpse of hope. McKnight hit into a fielders choice to score Brady Hendrickson and Hastings had runners on the corners with two outs. Unfortunately, that is where the game ended, Hastings 3, Eastview 6.
The loss put the Raiders in as a near lock for the sixth seed and that meant a trip to Rosemount on Memorial Day to take on the Irish.
At Rosemount
Hastings took a trip to the third seed Rosemount on Memorial Day for a 4:30 p.m. first pitch. Hastings fell 7-2, avoiding the shutout with two runs in the top of the seventh. We’ll have the details of that and the remainder of the section games in the next edition. Hastings will face Park of Cottage Grove, at home, on May 28 at 4:30 p.m. for the second game of the Section 3AAAA playoffs in a must win or go home game for the double elimination tournament’s elimination bracket.