Tigers squad crushes Emmett but falls to Middleton

After a win early in the week at Emmett, the Tigers were unable to hold onto leads against Middleton, losing two close games to the Vikings in their conference baseball series.

Tigers 8, Huskies 3

The Mountain Home Tigers took advantage of good pitching and timely hitting to down the Emmett Huskies 8-3 last Monday at Emmett.

The game was a make-up of the April 2 game that got snowed and rained out.

The Tigers scored single runs in the first and second innings, and added three more in both the third and fourth to build up an 8-1 lead.

Emmett scored single runs in the fifth and sixth to make it 8-3.

In the seventh, the Huskies loaded the bases with no outs and Tiger reliever Jon McCabe replaced starter Tom Hennessey on the mound. McCabe struck out the first batter he faced, got a force out at home plate on the next batter, and then a ground-out to end the threat and the game, the Tigers winning 9-3.

"I'm proud of the effort Tom put out there. He threw extremely well for us, and that's really the name of the game in a lot of ways when you have a pitcher that throws strikes and the momentum seems to go your way," said Tiger baseball coach Travis DeVore.

"He did a great job keeping hitters off balance, and then he did a great job at the plate as well, and so did Jake -- he did a great job at the plate -- and Eric's big double in the first inning, that certainly helped in terms of setting the tempo as well.

"You can't say enough about Jon McCabe coming in at the end and shutting the door with bases loaded and no outs. His numbers are outstanding this year, and we've put him in some tough positions and he's definitely stepped up to the occasion, so I'm definitely proud of the effort Jon McCabe put out there."

Jake Hennessey had three hits and scored three runs for the Tigers. Skyler Podesek had two hits and drove in a run. Trevor Woodruff had an RBI-triple, Eric Christiansen and Anthony Castillo both had RBI-doubles.

Tom Hennessey, who also had a hit, picked up the win, improving to 3-0 on the season. He scattered five hits, struck out seven and walked four.

Vikings 5, Tigers 3

Mountain Home scored three runs in the first inning on Jake Hennessey's three-run homer, but it would be all the runs they would score in the game, as the Middleton Vikings battled back with a three-run fifth to down the Tigers 5-3 Thursday at Middleton.

The Tigers outhit Middleton, 8-6. Tom Hennessey and Eric Christiansen both had two hits. Jake Hennessey had his three-run home run, and Brock Morris, Alex Rodriguez and Jon McCabe also had hits.

Eric Christiansen suffered the loss to drop to 2-3 on the season.

"Middleton hung close with us and took advantage of some late-inning key hits on their part and some miscues on ours, so it was a good win for Middleton, and obviously, another rough, kind of a rollercoaster ride for us," said Coach DeVore after the game.

Vikings 14, Tigers 11

The Tigers again took the lead early when the two faced off at Mountain Home on Friday, but a nine-run sixth inning for Middleton did the Tigers in.

Mountain Home built up a 5-1 lead after three, and led 6-2 after four innings, but an injury in the fifth seemed to turn the tide.

Tiger third baseman Trevor Woodruff took a hard-hit ball off his throwing hand with two out, and was forced to leave the game.

With Alex Rodriguez, who was pitching, the only other third baseman available, Coach DeVore was forced to go to his bullpen early and move Rodriguez to third. Jon McCabe, who had a great relief effort at Emmett on Monday, took over on the mound. He gave up a single and a walk to load the bases. A triple by K.J. Herbert cleared the bases and cut the Tiger lead to 6-5.

Mountain Home managed to push their lead to 7-5 with a run in the bottom half of the inning, but things unwound for the Tigers defensively in the sixth. A single and two walks loaded the bases and ended Jon McCabe's effort on the hill. Tom Hennessey, who had pitched into the seventh and got the win at Emmett on Monday, took over. Hennessey hit the first batter he faced, bringing in a run. Hennessey got the next batter out, but two big errors, sandwiched around some key hits, led to nine Middleton runs in the inning, as the Vikings took a 14-7 lead.

Mountain Home got a run in the sixth and got back-to-back triples in the seventh, but ended up three runs short, losing 14-11.

"We had a lot of momentum early in the game, but we just couldn't sustain it, and we had some bad luck stuff that hurt us. Trevor had warmed up to come in and pitch in that key sixth inning. Hurting his fingers the way he did was a killer for us.

"There's just a lot of things that we're doing right now that just aren't very fundamentally sound," he added. "Obviously, that's got to come back on me. We have to improve over the course of the season and ... get us a little more fired up and focused."

"I know it's tough during the course of the season, just emotionally, to sustain any sort of high, and the team starts looking forward to the district tournament and they start looking past these games. But we're capable of playing so much better and I've got to come out and get a little more focused practice plans going and get them a little more fired up, because this is not our style of baseball right now, we're a much better team than this."

Eric Christiansen had a great day at the plate, getting four hits including two doubles, a triple, an RBI and scoring three runs. Brock Morris had three hits and scored three runs. Jake Hennessey and Anthony Castillo both had two hits and drove in three runs. Hennessey had a triple and Castillo a double. Trevor Woodruff had an inside-the-park home run and drove in two runs. Kevin Anderson had an RBI-single and Devan Wilkinson also had a hit.

Jon McCabe suffered the loss to fall to 1-1 on the season.

The Tigers dropped to 5-7 in conference play and 14-8 overall. They hosted Nampa for Senior Night Tuesday night and travel to Nampa tonight (Wednesday) to close out the regular season against the Bulldogs.

The District III 4A Baseball Tournament begins Saturday at Bishop Kelly and Skyview.