Waterford Eliminates River Falls in Thriller
Waterford's Ryan Kiedrowski jumps in celebration after scoring the winning run, while his teammates chase down Tyler Terrian. Photo by Spencer Flaten for Wisconsin Baseball Central.
RIVER FALLS, Wis.—Waterford rallied in the bottom of the seventh inning to eliminate host River Falls from the Legion baseball Class AA state tournament with an 11-10 walk-off win on Friday.
The game went back and forth, and wasn’t decided until the final pitch of the game. Both teams thought they had the game locked down at certain points in the day. However, Tyler Terrian made sure that it was Waterford who came out on top.
Waterford's Cameron Prailes stumbles after losing a fly ball in the sun in the first inning. Photo by Spencer Flaten for Wisconsin Baseball Central.
River Falls opened the scoring with a four-run first inning. Lucas Luedtke drove in two of the runs with an RBI single and Ryan Flanagan hit a sacrifice fly for Post 121.
Waterford loaded the bases in the bottom of the first, but couldn’t get any runs across. That wouldn’t be the case for long, though.
After River Falls added another run in the top of the second via another RBI single by Luedtke, Waterford stormed back with six runs in the bottom of the inning to take the lead. Chris Saltzmann hit a three run home run and Matt Wezyk had an RBI single in the frame.
Waterford added another run in the third on an RBI single by Ryan Kiedrowski, which made their lead 7-5.
River Falls immediately responded in the top of the fourth with two runs to tie the game. Luedtke hit yet another RBI single and Mitch Feyereisen hit a sacrifice fly to level the score at 7-7.
Waterford broke the tie again in the bottom of the fourth with two runs, highlighted by another RBI single by Kiedrowski.
A three-run rally in the top of the sixth gave River Falls a 10-9 lead and put them in great position to see out the win. Two runs scored on errors and Mason Graetz hit an RBI single to plate the other run.
Waterford's Ryan Kiedrowski pumps up his teammates after leading off the bottom of the seventh with a double. Photo by Spencer Flaten for Wisconsin Baseball Central.
Down 10-9 in the bottom of the seventh and facing what could have been their final three outs of the season, Waterford loaded the bases with just one out. Terrian stepped up to the plate and lined an RBI single to centerfield with two strikes to plate the winning run.
In a game full of fantastic offensive performances, Kiedrowski and River Falls’ Trey Larson shined the brightest. Both had four hits, and Kiedrowski finished with two RBIs. Luedtke went 3-for-5 with four RBIs for River Falls.
Nick Draheim got the win for Waterford after pitching two scoreless innings in relief.
Waterford (16-7) will face the loser of the game between Menasha and Antigo at 4 p.m. on Saturday in another elimination game. River Falls finished the season with an 18-11 record.
