St. Michael Splits with Blaine, Falls to Coon Rapids

The St. Michael Saints baseball club was ousted of the State Class B Tournament Playoffs Saturday. After posting a win over Blaine in the first round, losses to Coon Rapids and Blaine (in a rematch) ended the Saints' season. 

The secured their 16^th win of the season Friday night, with an upset of the Fusion from Blaine. The Saints, seeded third, used a defensive effort to win2-0 at the Rec Center in Saint Michael.

Although playing at their home field, the Saints technically played as the away team due to their lower seed. This allowed Saint Michael pitcher Blaine Barthel to pitch all nine innings for his fourth complete game of the season.

In the victory, also his 4^th of the year, Barthel allowed 6 hits and walked a batter, but his defense turned three double plays behind him to help preserve the shutout. Barthel was showing signs of excitement with fist-pumps and high-fives to his teammates after the later innings and even sent a Tweet on Thursday night that said he had a big day tomorrow with Saints baseball. Even though Barthel didn't strike out any batters, he pitched very effectively with a few 1-2-3 innings, including the fourth inning, when he needed less than 10 pitches to retire the side.

Saint Michael's offense sputtered in the early innings, scattering just three singles through the first five innings.

In a game that seemed like it could be decided by one run, the Saints struck first in the sixth. Leading off the inning, catcher Sam Boisner ripped a double to the fence that landed over the head of Blaine's centerfielder Dan Mossey. It comes as no surprise that Boisner had two hits in the game, as he led the Saints with a .373 batting average during the regular season.

The Volkmann boys kept the inning going, with third baseman Nick hitting an infield single and designated hitter Chris clearing the bases with a double to right field. Even though the Saints would have felt more at ease with some extra insurance runs, no other Saint would cross the plate in the game.

With the win the Saints moved on to the second round, facing the top seed Coon Rapids Saturday morning. 

The Saints couldn't find the pitching or defense they had in the Section Semifinal, falling to the eventual 8B Champ, Coon Rapids, 14-9. 

Playing, again, as the visiting team, the Saints actually held a 4-2 lead over Coon Rapids heading into the bottom of the fifth. But the Redbirds exploded for 12 runs over the next four innings, including a five-spot in the bottom of the fifth to take a 7-4 lead and never look back. 

In the loser-out game, the Saints faced off with the Fusion again, and simply dug themselves too big of a hole. Blaine put up nine runs in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings, and held off a rally (five runs) by the Saints in the top of the ninth to advance with an 11-7 win. 

Chris Volkmann was huge again, this time in defeat, with two hits and two big runs batted in. Dane Carlson also had a pair of RBI.