The Mid-Prairie baseball team gave a great effort Tuesday night against #1 defending state champion Davis County in the district semi finals at Eddyville-Blakesburg High School but in the end the Mustangs were too much, posting a 12-1 win. The Golden Hawks led 1-0 just two batters into the game when Jason Schrock led off with a triple to right center and Seth Eash followed that with a bloop over shortstop to put Mid-Prairie on the board against future Iowa Hawkeye pitcher Calvin Matthews. The Golden Hawks maintained that 1-0 margin into the fourth inning with a great start from Nick Stimson, Stimson went three plus innings surrendered just two runs to the high powered Mustangs, who’s team batting average was over .400, only one of those runs was earned and he struck out three. Mid-Prairie Head Coach Ryan Koller talked in the post game about his team’s great start

“We have heard about Mathews, and that he will throw fastballs until we start hitting them,” Koller said. “That was the goal, in 80 innings he has walked four people. We were just going out to hit the ball and put the ball into play, and we did that the first inning and jumped on him. We kept it close for four innings, what a great time.”

The second time through the line up Davis County got to Mid-Prairie pitching, after taking a 2-1 advantage in the fourth the Mustangs posted eight runs on seven hits in the fifth while Mid-Prairie made several pitching changes to try and slow them down. Every Mustang recorded at least one hit and one run scored. With the loss Mid-Prairie ends their season in the second round of district play for the second straight year. However as Koller said in the post game show the teams overall 21-17 record is a big step forward in the rebuilding process.

“Going 8-24 is a pretty tough season, and then starting off 5-11, and then finishing [with 15 wins out of 21 games] really seemed like a program that turned the corner, seniors is coming through the whole lineup is coming through,” Koller said. “I only hope that next year we can build on this, that 21 wins isn’t enough, that is where we need to get to, the four [seniors] are irreplaceable, as far as who they are as human beings, leadership, working hard. I credit pretty much our turnaround to those four seniors.”

Mid-Prairie finished the year winning 15 of their last 21 games. You can hear the full post game interview with Mid-Prairie Head Coach Ryan Koller on tonight’s PM Sports page at 6 on AM and FM KCII and KCIIradio.com,