Stillwater's hopes of claiming a second state baseball championship were dashed on Friday as Maple Grove defeated the Ponies, 4-1, in the Class AAA semifinals at Midway Stadium.
"We want to challenge our opponents and we just didn't do that today," Ponies coach Mike Parker said. "We hit a lot of fly balls, gave them a lot of easy outs."
One day after blitzing Suburban East Conference rival Forest Lake, 9-0, in the state quarterfinals, Stillwater managed just two hits and one unearned run against the Crimson.
Find out what's happening in Stillwaterfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
"We'd like to have some of those runs from last night today, that's for sure," Parker said.
The Ponies trailed 3-0 heading into the bottom of the third when centerfielder Pad Getchell scored his team's lone tally on a wild pitch after intially getting on base on a Maple Grove error.
Find out what's happening in Stillwaterfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Only one more Stillwater player—pitcher Joe Zorn, who hit a sixth-inning single—reached base after that as the Ponies went down in order in the fourth, fifth, and lastly, seventh innings.
Catcher Tom Forster claimed Stillwater's other hit as the senior reached base twice in the contest with a single and a walk.
"Their pitcher was better than ours, and that's not to say that our pitcher was bad, he was fine, but theirs was just better today," Parker said.
Zorn suffered the loss on the mound, giving up five hits, four walks and two wild pitches in a full seven innings of work. The senior was tagged for two earned runs as well as two unearned runs while striking out four Crimson batters.
After a quick intermission, Stillwater took on Rochester Century for third-place honors on Friday night and defeated the Cougars, 3-2, to end its season with a victory.
Second baseman Will Anderson singled home Forester with what would prove to be the winning run in the bottom of the fifth inning as the Ponies rallied from a 2-1 third-inning deficit for the win.
Starting pitcher Austin Booher earned Stillwater's final victory of the season with a complete-game six-hitter, allowing two unearned runs and walking three while striking out 10 batters.
The triumph gave the Ponies a final record of 21-6 this season.
