Class 2A baseball: Oktaha routs Cashion to claim spring state championship
SHAWNEE — Despite a more-than-comfortable lead, Oktaha baseball coach Kevin Rodden was still in coach mode when Kip Christian came to the plate in the bottom of the sixth inning.
With the potential for a game-ending run-rule victory in Christian’s at-bat, Rodden wanted to make sure there were no mistakes brought on by the excitement of becoming a state champion.
“You see all the blunders on social media where somebody doesn’t go touch first base,” Rodden said. “So I told him, if you do get a hit, make sure you get to first base.”
It wasn’t necessary, with Christian instead ending the game on a sacrifice fly to left field, scoring Maddox Edwards from third base for a 15-5 run-rule win over Cashion in six innings Saturday in the Class 2A state championship game at Ed Skelton Field.
“These guys deserve it,” Rodden said. “Our school, our community, our administration — we have so much support where we’re at. I can’t say enough about our guys, because they work relentlessly to get to this point.”
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While the title was Oktaha’s third in baseball, this was the first in spring, taking the 2A mantle from Silo, which had won the previous six spring championships in the class. But Silo moved to 3A this year, opening the door for a new champ.
And junior Darren Ledford was happy to see his squad fill the void.
“I’ve been to state six times in my career, and finally got it,” said Ledford, who has been to each fall and spring state tournament in his career. “I’ve been to three finals in all of those, and now we’ve finally got a title.”
Ledford, who began the game at catcher, was 3 for 4 with three RBIs. Edwards was 3 for 3 with an RBI and three runs scored.
That duo did all the work on the mound as well.
“Our goal was to come in and get to this game with Maddox and Darren (available to pitch), we knew we had a really good chance,” Rodden said.
Edwards got Oktaha through the first three innings and handed the ball to Ledford, who allowed just two walks over three hitless innings to end the game.
But the game swung thanks to the Tiger bats in the bottom of the fourth inning. Nicolas Tolbert came through with the big at-bat, lining a double down the right field line to score three of Oktaha’s seven runs in the inning.
“We knew we would get our bats rolling by the end of the game,” Ledford said. “And we did it.”
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma high school baseball: Oktaha routs Cashion for Class 2A title
