Eagles Baseball Team Wins Diamond Battle In Opener

The Holden high school baseball team opened the season at home with a win over Aurora by the final score of 4-2 on Saturday, Mar. 22.

Eagle starting pitcher Wes Brown held the Houn Dawgs to one run through five innings before reliever Tucker Kauffman took to the hill with three runners on to close out the final stretch of the game as Holden totaled six hits on the day.

“This was a quality, competitive game for our first game of the year,” said Holden baseball head coach Jeff Smith. “Wes pitched a solid five-and-a-third. He had quite a few 3-2 counts which got into his pitch count. He will continue to be more efficient as the season progresses. He is a solid hard throwing lefty that is hard to square up. He will have many quality starts this year that will hold the opposing team to very few runs.

“Tucker closed the game,” continued coach Smith. “This was his first appearance on the varsity mound and he pitched great! He got us out of a bases loaded, one-out jam with only allowing one run. We could not have asked for a better performance from him. We are hoping that he can continue that execution on the mound for the rest of the season. He has looked great as a pitcher in practices leading up to this game, so we gave him the opportunity and he did not disappoint.”
The Eagles found the scoreboard in the third inning by plating two runs which were sparked by a single from shortstop Cohen Drake with one out. Catcher Drake Gard followed Drake’s single with a double to plate the shortstop for Holden’s first run.

Following a walk drawn by Kauffman, senior second baseman Tyler Barker put the ball in play to score courtesy runner Chasen Hall for a 2-1 Holden lead.

Holden added two runs in the fifth inning after Gard drew a walk with two outs. In again as a courtesy runner for Gard, Hall stole second base and scored on a ground ball hit by Kauffman.

Barker and right fielder Justin Brown drew walks to load the bases before a single by third baseman Vance Davis pushed Kauffman across the plate.

“Our at bats were shaky in the first few innings,” said coach Smith. “Not scoring a run in the first with bases loaded and no outs hurt, but our approaches at the plate improved greatly in the last three innings of the game.

“We finally put balls in play with runners in scoring position and scored our four runs. The middle and back end of our lineup came in clutch in those situations. Tucker, Drake, and Vance each had an RBI along with Tyler putting a ball in play to score a run. We scored four runs off of quality pitching without the top two batters in the lineup doing much. That is a good sign of things to come. We ran the bases well. We have multiple guys on the bench with speed that can enter the game as courtesy or pinch runners as we need.

“As long as we can continue to be smart on the bases, I can be aggressive on steals and sends and get a few more runs across,” continued coach Smith. “All in all, I was proud of the way that our team handled adversity and used their experience to stay calm with some very questionable calls from the umpiring crew and come out with the win.”

Drake totaled 2 hits and scored 1 run in the game. Gard, Kauffman, and Davis each had 1 hit and 1 RBI. Senior center fielder Kale Tryon had 1 hit and 1 walk. Justin Brown had 1 hit.

In the season-opening start, Wes Brown allowed 4 hits and 4 walks while recording 10 strikeouts.

Pitching in relief, Kauffman had 1 strikeout while allowing no hits and no walks.

The next game for the Holden baseball team is scheduled for Monday, Mar. 31, when the Eagles open MRVC-East play with a home game against Knob Noster. The varsity game begins at 4:30 p.m. with a JV game to follow.