Abby/Colby baseball opens season 1-1
Baseball co-op
defeats ‘Cards falls to Tigers
The Abbotsford/Colby baseball co-op had to do a bit of travelling in order to start their season last week. With sodden fields over at Red Arrow Park, Abby/ Colby went to Mauston and the Woodside Sports Complex on March 29 and April 1.
Whilethere,theco-opwent1-1ingames against Thorp and New Richmond.
The Abbotsford/Colby baseball co-op opened up the 2022 season with a tricky opponent, taking on the Thorp Cardinals in Mauston’s Woodside Sports Complex on Tuesday, March 29.
The Cardinals have been one of the more consistent programs not just in central Wisconsin, but in the entire state, making it to the sectional semifinals last year, and finishing runner up in the WIAA D-4 state title game in 2018.
Neither team could penetrate the other’s defense in the early goings of the non-conference match-up. JV Castillo threw three scoreless innings for Abby/ Colby, and through three innings, the scored remained deadlocked at 0-0.
Thorp broke that stalemate at the top of the first, scoring their lone run for a 1-0 lead. That run seemed to wake something up in Colby, for in the bottom of the fifth inning, the co-op finally got on board.
Thorp held Abby/Colby to just the one run, and the teams were once again locked up at even terms, tied 1-1. Abby/ Colby held the Cardinals scoreless in the top of the six, but then found their offensive in the bottom of that same inning.
The co-op picked up a pair of runs to put all the pressure back on Thorp, and the Cardinals could not find any seams in Abby/Colby’s defense at the top of the seventh. Nor could they get past the live arm of Brandon Diedrich, who closed the door on any Thorp comeback with two scoreless innings.
Diedrich took the win on the mound, pitching two innings, striking out two batters and allowing no hits, runs or walks. JV Castillo was even more effective in his three innings, fanning five batters, with no hits or runs and just three walks.
Mateo Lopez pitched two innings and gave up one hit, one run and one walk en route to striking out two batters.
Thorp’s pitching kept the ‘Cards in much of the game, striking out seven Abby/Colby batters, and giving up just one hit on 22 at-bats.
Carlos Lara had the lone hit for the coop, in his lone appearance at home plate. Payton Schreiber and Castillo had RBI’s for Abby/Colby.
The Abbotsford/Colby baseball co-op faced sterner competition just a few days later on April 1 as they battled the New Richmond Tigers, again at the Woodside Sports Complex in Mauston.
Abbotsford and Colby’s combined numbers puts them squarely in Division Two, with a combined enrollment of just over 500. New Richmond on the other hand is a Division One program, with just a shade under one thousand students in its high school.
Those extra numbers gave New Richmond a bigger talent pool to draw from, and a deeper bench to dip into. Nonetheless, the co-op got off to a quick start, taking a 1-0 lead at the top of the first inning.
The Tigers wasted little time in turning the tables on the co-op. New Richmond undid the damage, and then took advantage of Abby/Colby’s JV Castillo, taking a 2-1 lead after one inning.
Castillo would have a rough day at the office, walking seven batters, and giving up six runs on six hits in 4 - 2/3 innings, suffering the loss at the pitcher’s mound. Castillo struck out four batters.
But whatever struggles Castillo might have had at the mound, he nearly made up for it at home plate, leading the co-op on offense with some excellent hitting.
Castillo led Abby/Colby, connecting on three of his four trips at bat, with two runs scored for the co-op. Castillo also led Abby/Colby in stolen bases, finishing with two steals.
Unfortunately, New Richmond’s pitching kept Abby/Colby at bay. Brandon Diedrich, Mateo Lopez, Eric Reis, Jaxson Polivka, Payton Schreiber and Blake Bargender all had multiple turns at bat, but came away empty-handed.
Only Carlos Lara was able to connect from the batter’s box, finishing with one hit, a double, in three at-bats as New Richmond struck out six Abby/Colby batters, and walked another three in 25 attempts at-bat by the co-op.
Both sides went scoreless in the second inning, and Abby/Colby got the game back to even terms, with a Castillo run that made it 2-2. But the joy was shortlived. New Richmond held the co-op scorless in the fourth and fifth innings, and then added one run in the fourth, all but put the game away in the fifth, courtesy of a three run out-burst.
Reis relieved Castillo at the pitcher’s mound, and did his job, holding New Richmond scoreless in the game’s final 1 1/3 innings.
However, even with Reis and Castillo refusing to give up any runs in the final innings, the Tigers returned the favor, and gave Abbotsford/Colby their first loss of the 2022 season.
Abby/Colby games for April 2 with Reedsburg and Amery were cancelled.
The co-op’s home opener is scheduled for Friday, April 8 against the Newman Catholic Cardinals, weather permitting. The game is set to begin at 4:45 p.m.
