Tourney time arrives for Imperial peewee teams
Imperial 2 and Imperial 3 played in two of the first three games of the Tri-County peewee tournament Monday in Paxton.
Sutherland, the eighth seed, beat Ogallala 2, the ninth seed, in the tournament’s opening game.
Imperial 2, seeded sixth, followed that game with a 20-1 win over the 11th seed, Ogallala 3.
Ogallala 3’s lead off batter scored and the team loaded the bases before back-to-back strikeouts ended the top of the first inning.
Lukas Fries started Imperial 2 off with a walk before a barrage of singles by his teammates. Tate Teply, Lleyton McDaniel, Conner Stromberger, Evan O’Neil and Taylor Maddux all singled and came around to score. Zak Anderson walked and scored on a single by Tyce Hammerlun, who also scored.
Fries and James Bomba pitched for Imperial 2. Fries struck out the side in the second inning and Bomba struck out four and forced batters into two ground outs in the third and fourth innings.
Offensively, Imperial 2’s bats stayed hot in the second inning. Maddux singled twice and Hammerlun hit a double to lead Imperial 2 to a nine hit, nine-run second inning.
Destry Oxford tripled to lead off the third inning. Hammerlun, Fries and O’Neil also singled to help Imperial 2 add three more to the board and wrap up the 20-1 win.
Tenth-seeded Imperial 3 ended the evening with a 1-30 loss to Hershey, the seventh seed.
Imperial 3 missed out on a bases loaded opportunity in the second inning. Aaron Cervantes scored in the third inning for Imperial 3.
Tournament continues
As the top seed, Imperial 1 had Monday off and played Sutherland Tuesday.
Imperial 2 will play third seeded Wallace Wednesday at 4 p.m. MT in Paxton. The winner will face either Grant, the second seed, or Hershey Thursday night at 6:15 p.m. MT.
In the top half of the bracket, The Imperial 1/Sutherland winner will play the winner of fourth-seeded Ogallala 1 and fifth-seeded Paxton at 4 p.m. MT Thursday.
The consolation game, between losers of Thursday’s games, will be Friday at 4 p.m. MT.
The championship game will be Friday at 6:15 p.m. MT.
Regular season finales
Imperial 1 and Imperial 2 faced off for their final game of the regular season July 1.
Imperial 1 took an early 2-0 lead in the game. Krayton Paisley walked, then scored on a Cole Pankonin single. Three stolen bases brought Pankonin home, as well. Imperial 1 ended the inning with runners on second and third.
After Imperial 2 went three up, three down in the bottom of the first, both teams stranded runners on second in the second inning.
Walks by Pankonin, Miles Hanes and Cristobal Tarango Flores, plus a single by Tucker Mollendor and double by Parker Terryberry, plated four runs by Imperial 1 in the top of the third.
The lead was cut in half in the bottom of the inning. Teply singled to start Imperial 2’s at bat. Stromberger walked and Brextin Moreno singled to load the bases. An error and a single by Oxford brought the three base runners home.
Imperial 1 picked up the fourth inning where it left off in the third.
Pankonin singled before Mollendor and Hanes hit back-to-back doubles. All three scored to increase Imperial 1’s lead to 9-3.
After a scoreless bottom of the fourth for Imperial 2 and top of the fifth for Imperial 1, Hammerlun singled to reach base and stole three bases to score for Imperial 2.
Imperial 1 tacked on two more runs in the sixth inning when singles by Pankonin, Mollendor and Jackson Cyboron scored Pankonin and Mollendor.
Imperial 2 advanced runners to second and third, but was unable to add any runs.
Imperial 1 won 11-4.
Noah Rau allowed five hits and walked four in the game for Imperial 1. Rau struck out eight.
Pankonin and Mollendor each went 3-3 for Imperial 1.
Stromberger and Oxford pitched for Imperial 2. They combined to give up nine hits and seven walks while striking out 10.
Imperial’s youngest team lost to Sutherland June 29.
Adan Mireles and Dietrich Pursley scored for Imperial 3, leaving the game tied 2-2 at the end of the first.
Paxton scored three runs in the second inning and 13 in the third inning.
Paxton scored seven more runs in the fourth inning, but Cervantes, Aidan Tomky, Dylan Miscles, Zariah Carman and Jason Trevizo all crossed home plate in the fourth for Imperial 3.
Imperial 3 fell to Paxton June 30.
After giving up six runs to start the game, Imperial 3 stranded runners on second and third in the first inning and third and first in the third inning.
Paxton added one run in the second inning and seven in the third.
Imperial 3 Head Coach Dustin Harris said moving up to peewee was a big adjustment for his team who played pony league two summers ago and didn’t get to play last summer due to COVID-19.
“The boys had a lot of new things thrown at them, but they battled and stuck together as a team,” Harris said.
Harris thanked Armando Villarreal and Caleb Pursley for helping coach, Becky Bernard for keeping books and Super Foods for the donation of supplies for a fundraiser.