The Blair baseball team knew what it was up against in Saturday's Class B District 1 semifinal in Waverly.
The Bears had gone to battle with the Norris Titans before.
“We were up on them last time and they came back,” BHS infielder Nate Wachter said Friday. “So, we can't let that happen.”
“We've got to take this momentum and keep it rolling into the next game and, hopefully, the next game,” junior Shea Wendt added after the Bears' 9-4 first round win against Arlington.
It just didn't happen.
The 19-6 Titans were better at Lawson Park on Saturday, ending Blair's spring season at 8-10 overall with a 6-1 win.
“Ran out of innings,” coach James Bilslend said.
While BHS pitchers J'Shawn Unger and Wendt combined for 11 strikeouts, Norris tallied 15 against the Bears' lineup. Senior Landon Meyer earned 14 of those Ks over six innings, making sure the three runs the Titans scored during the first inning held.
“We just didn't have the proper approach to hit a fastball today,” Bilslend said.
Blair scored its lone run during the second inning when Conner O'Neil plated Unger. O'Neil, the Bears' senior catcher, went 2-for-3 as did infielder Dylan Swanson. Wendt and Wachter added a hit apiece, too, though no BHS batters walked against Meyer.
The loss ended an eight-win campaign for the Bears, who missed out on multiple games due to weather conditions and field conditions this spring. They fell short of the their high expectations, but Bilslend said the postgame huddle was about the future and reaching those goals with offseason work.
For four seniors, though, Saturday's game was their final as a BHS ballplayer. They are O'Neil, Tyler Andersen, Matt Burns and Kolton Hammer.
Bears top Arlington
Blair's 9-4, first-round victory against Arlington came after more than a week without a game due to rain and adverse field conditions.
“We were a little rusty,” Swanson, the winning pitcher, said of the Bears' 4-2 deficit through five innings. “But then we just kind of got the kinks out and started playing better. Playing our baseball.”
The game-winning push came in the form of a six-run sixth inning. It turned the two-run Bears deficit into a four-run lead with 1.5 innings to go.
“We had to get a win,” Wachter said.
Greyson Kay led off with a single before O'Neil hit a double to the left field fence.
“Momentum was our way,” Wachter said.
The BHS infielder stepped into the box and swung at an off-target pitch to start his at-bat, but got ahold of the second for a 4-4 tie.
Arlington switched pitchers, but Tyler Andersen reached with a bunt single. Both he and Wachter scored on Eagle miscues for a 6-4 advantage before junior slugger Shea Wendt stepped up to the plate with Swanson already on base.
“Just felt confident,” Wendt said. “Went up there and I was sitting fastball, for sure, and he gave me one.”
The Bear's bat carried the baseball well over the 325-foot left field fence for a two-run homer.
“Put a good swing on it and a good thing happened,” he said.
Two outs later, Arlington got out of the inning, but with an 8-4 deficit. Blair's lead grew to five runs on Brady Brown's seventh-inning, infield RBI single as coach Bilslend's team picked up its eighth win of the season.
“Let our defense play and just minimize my walks,” Swanson said of the afternoon's pitching plan. “You know, just help us win.”
It was the Bears' last victory of the spring.
