The Tea Toros earned their first win of the season last week when the amateur team dropped Scotland in seven innings.
The final score in Tea that night was 18-0.
“It feels fantastic,” Coach Mike Denning said. “It’s a great confidence booster for us.”
Strong hitting made the difference this time out, the coach said. The past few games have seen strong pitching performances Tea’s hitters couldn’t seem to match.
“Our hitting came around,” Denning said. “We just lit it up, hitting-wise – everybody got a hit and everybody got on base at least once.”
The game got off to a slow start, with both Tea and Scotland scoring runs in the first inning and going up and out in the second.
The Toros took over in the third on the bats of Rob Schramm, Kevin Cheppenko, Ryan Forsstrom, Kellen Hackett and BJ Glasgow. Glasgow hit a grand slam home run near the end of the inning to bring home all the batters.
Tea scored three more in the fourth, two in the sixth and six in the seventh to put the brakes on Scotland’s hopes for a win.
The team scored its 18 runs on 20 hits. Scotland scored its eight on 10 hits. The teams had two errors apiece.
Glasgow, Schramm and Bryan Vyhlidal went 3-for-4 on Thursday, and Vyhlidal had two doubles and five RBIs. Alex Watkins and Hackett each went 3-for-5.
On the mound, Mike Gorsett started out the game and pitched to seven batters in two innings. He allowed a hit, a run struck out one batter.
Schramm finished up the game, pitching the remaining five innings and taking the win. Schramm struck out three of 20 batters.
The coach said the team’s main pitcher, Cheppenko, will have recovered by Tuesday, when the team takes on Garretson during “Rage in the Cage” in Sioux Falls.
Cheppenko struck out 16 Wynot batters just over a week ago, he said, putting the Toros within striking distance of last year’s amateur baseball championship runners-up.
“If we’d have hit the ball against them, we’d have beat one of the best teams in the state,” Denning said.