HARRISON — After its first doubleheader of the season was cancelled because of the weather, Grayling’s baseball team enjoyed better conditions Monday afternoon and made the trip to Harrison for a twin bill.
The Vikings swung some heavy bats early and stung the Hornets with a 17-2 victory in the first game which lasted only three innings because of the mercy rule.
Grayling freshman Corbin Allen took the bump in the first game and pitched all three innings, giving up three hits and rang up six strike outs.
Leading the Vikings at the plate were sophomore Logan Malonen with a pair of singles and two runs batted in. Allen helped his own cause with two doubles, and drove in three runs, junior Cole Dickie drove in two runs with his base hit and Owen Triebold had a run batted in with his hit.
Trevor Cvitkovich (sophomore), junior Jacob Hartman and sophomore Jake Huspen each had a base hit. As a team, the Vikings drew seven walks.
“It was our first time as a team out on the field, and it’s always a little bit of a tossup as to what you’re going to get,” said Grayling head coach Bret Krabill, “coupled with throwing a freshman on the mound.”
What was nice is we got nine runs the first inning being the away team. That alleviated a lot of pressure for the pitcher. We scored eight in the second inning.
“Pitching is what we have to develop the most right now, and it took 56 pitches to get through the three innings. We only had a couple fielding chances, but we didn’t make any errors. We’ll take that.”
In the nightcap, Harrison missed an extra point as the Vikings pulled out a 14-13 victory (that’s a joke).
Harrison took a 1-0 lead after the first inning, but the Vikings rallied for three in the second. The Hornets put up seven in the third for an 8-3 lead.
Grayling plated three more runs in the top half of the fourth, climbing to within two, 8-6. The Hornets scored four in the bottom of the inning to bump their lead up to 12-6.The Vikings bounced back with five runs, and the Hornets pushed across one in the fifth to take a two-run lead, 13-11 going into the sixth. Grayling scored three in the sixth.
Malonen picked up the win in relief, throwing the final two innings.
“Everybody was hitting the ball,” Krabill said. “Malonen just peppered the zone, and picked up the pace, which I think threw Harrison off a little bit.”
“Cole Dickie started the game, and was pretty solid through the first two innings. We got a quick out in the third, and then Cole tried to take over everything on his own. We ended up walking 10 batters and hitting two.”
“But, we didn’t fold so I’m super, super happy with that. Last year’s team, I don’t know if they come back and win that one. We knew we could score every inning, so we weren’t worried about that.”
“All but one of our starters scored a run. We only struck out four times in the six-inning game, which I’m happy to see.”
Leading the Vikings at the plate was Cvitkovich, who was 4-for-5 and drove in a pair. Triebold ended up with two hits and drove in a run.
Malonen had a two-run double. Aydden Clark (sophomore) drove in a run with a base hit, as did Allen. Huspen had two hits, including a bases clearing triple with the bases loaded and had four runs batted in.
