By VINCE LOVERGINE
TopSports.news
A cold windy night at the Bettis Family Sports Complex Tuesday night did not fare too well for the Shawnee Heights baseball team, as the bats went cold in a 6-2 United Kansas Conference loss to Basehor-Linwood.
Basehor-Linwood jumped out to a 2-0 lead after a couple of RBI singles but Heights also hurt itself, committing two errors in the inning and four total in the game.
In the first two innings Shawnee Heights went three up, three down, including three strikeouts.
The Bobcats led 3-0 in the top of the third inning and began the inning reaching base with an error that opened the door to score two more runs, pushing the advantage to 5-0.
SHHS made a pitching change in the middle of the inning, replacing starter Cambren Floberg for Keaven Ortiz.
“I told Cam, 'You come out here and there’s just days you don’t have it. It happens to all of us. Let it go and it’s about the next time you go on the mound. It’s over with and you can’t fix it,' ” Heights coach Jason Brown said. “He threw strikes, a little unlucky behind him, a lack of focus there but I think he’ll be fine come his next outing.”
The T-Birds went one-two-three in the third despite starting inning with an infield hit. After a double play and a strikeout, any momentum vanished.
Basehor-Linwood took a 6-0 lead in the fourth, and yet again, Heights went one-two-three, ending the inning with a double play.
Through five innings the T-Birds had just two hits, but in the sixth they were able to scratch one across the board as Makade Orton ripped an RBI single into right before being thrown out trying to advance to second base.
Thomas Smith for Shawnee Heights came in at the top of the sixth and retired all six batters he faced to give the T-Birds some hope.
After Steven Zimbelman completed six innings, striking out seven, allowing two walks and one earned run, his brother Colin Zimbelman came on in relief.
The T-Birds loaded the bases with no outs, giving Heights some life at a comeback.
Cayden Lindsay grounded into a double play to push across one run, making it 6-2, and Michael Lilly couldn’t keep the rally going, striking out swinging to end the game.
“We walked on here and we were sleep walking and you can’t do that,” Brown said. “You have to show up and be ready to go every time you step on the field. We tell our players there are three facets to the game, you swing it well, you pitch it well and take care of it behind our pitcher and two of those three we did not do.
“The good thing about this game is the two guys that we brought in relief, we hadn’t thrown them yet this year and us as a coaching staff we found out that some of them are ready. So that was a positive to take something out of this game. We have a lot of baseball left and I think this will wake them up and when you step on the field, you can’t take any days off.”
BASEHOR-LINWOOD 6, SHAWNEE HEIGHTS 2
Basehor-Linwood (3-3) 212 100 0 -- 6 5 1
Shawnee Heights (4-2) 000 001 1 -- 2 4 4
W -- S. Zimbelman L -- Floberg. 2B – Basehor-Linwood: Kiernan.
