Baseball roundup: Paynesville Bulldogs pull out a tourney title
Apr. 28—PAYNESVILLE — The Paynesville baseball team had some work to do in its home tournament. The Bulldogs trailed St. Cloud Cathedral 4-1 through three innings.
In the bottom of the fourth, Paynesville got to work. The Bulldogs scored four times in the inning and shut out the Crusaders the rest of the way to win its home tournament Saturday, 5-4.
Paynesville opened the tournament with a 10-1 win against Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg. Cathedral beat Long Prairie-Grey Eagle 3-0 in its first-round matchup.
The Bulldogs got the comeback started with a two-run double by Josiah Utsch. Brayden Pung followed that with an RBI single. Abe Brunner drove in the eventual winning run with a sacrifice fly that scored Esau Nelson.
Bryce VanderBeek led the Bulldogs, going 2-for-3 with a double and a run.
Reed Johnson stepped up in relief of starting pitcher Brandon Carlson by tossing six shutout innings. Johnson struck out nine and gave up just two hits and a walk.
Tanner Staller went 2-for-4 with a double and a run for St. Cloud Cathedral.
Paynesville travels to Elrosa to play Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa at 4:30 p.m. Monday.
Jared Cortez gave up two hits in a five-inning complete game in Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg's victory over Long Prairie-Grey Eagle at Paynesville.
Cortez struck out eight, giving up two hits and no walks. Offensively, he was 2-for-4 with a double, two RBIs and two runs.
Evan Zimmer finished 1-for-3 with a double, two runs and an RBI for the Fighting Saints. Logan Johnson was 1-for-2 with three runs and an RBI in the victory.
KMS goes to Raymond to play MACCRAY at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.
A five-run bottom-of-the-fourth inning helped Paynesville pull away from Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg in the opening game of the tournament at Paynesville.
Esau Nelson led the way to the Bulldogs' victory. He was 2-for-3 with a double and an RBI. He also tossed all seven innings, striking out 12.
Brayden Pung went 2-for-4 with two RBIs for Paynesville. Isaac Lieser also had two hits, two runs and an RBI.
Jared Cortez was 1-for-3 with a double and a run scored for the Fighting Saints. Jett Olson was 1-for-3 with an RBI, and Logan Rudningen finished 1-for-2.
Trinity School at River Ridge scored the winning run on a double steal in an eight-inning victory over Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City at Kingery Field in Atwater.
The Falcons fell to 0-8 despite out-hitting the Tri Hawks 6-4.
Isaiah Renne was 1-for-2 with a double, an RBI and a stolen base for ACGC. Jonas Morrison was 1-for-3 with an RBI.
The Falcons host Eden Valley-Watkins at 4:30 p.m. Monday in Atwater.
