The Mid-Prairie Golden Hawk baseball team begins the tournament trail tonight in Wellman when they host the West Branch Bears in the district semifinals of class 2A. The Golden Hawks had a successful regular season, winning an outright south division championship in the River Valley Conference and sharing an overall RVC title with Camanche, the Hawks first overall conference crown in 20 years. They were 12-3 during the regular season, winners of 10 of their last 11 and enter play ranked No. 6 in class 2A in the final poll from the Iowa High School Baseball Coaches Association. Mid-Prairie is hitting .333 as a team, fifth best in Iowa. The Hawks are led by Aidan Rath at .575 for the year, second best in Iowa. He has accounted for 23 hits, 21 RBI, three home runs and has walked another 14 times. Mid-Prairie has a 2.63 team ERA, led by Keegan Gingerich at 0.86 in 24 and a third innings of work and a 4-0 overall record. Senior teammate Brad Tornow is 5-0 this year with a 0.95 ERA and his 42 strikeouts are sixth best in the state, tops for any pitcher with less than 25 innings thrown.

West Branch comes in with an overall record of 6-9. The Bears were 5-5 in the River Valley Conference during the regular season. West Branch got by Williamsburg in the opening round of district play in Wellman Saturday by a 10-5 score led by Trey Eagle with three hits and Tanner Lukavsky with three RBI and a home run. For the season the Bears are hitting .304 as a team led by Cael Fiderlein at .410 with 16 hits and 10RBI. On the mound the Bears have a team ERA of 4.90 led by Matt Whaley at an even three with nine innings thrown. Matt Paulsen has worked the most on the staff this year, across his 30 and two thirds innings he has a 3-1 record and 3.42ERA. This week Mid-Prairie seniors Brad Tornow and Brody Miller along with Mid-Prairie head coach Andy Greiner talked about what they have been working on to get ready to open the postseason. “I think Anamosa revealed a bit of a weakness for us offensively in that we need to work on playing small ball to manufacture runs when they are tough to come by. We need to get together, have a practice, tighten things up and be ready and healthy to go on Tuesday. We’re planning on a lot of reps and need to work on being perfect. Now is the time the pressure is on.”

Mid-Prairie beat the Bears on the road two weeks ago by a 9-1 score. You can hear all of the action live tonight from Paul N. Bailey Field in Wellman, beginning with the Washington HyVee pregame show at 6:30 and first pitch at 7p.m. on AM 1380, FM 102.5 and KCIIradio.com.