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All about execution

Focus on fundamentals helps Alcona sweep Posen

News Photo by James Andersen Alcona's Luke Loyer, left, slides under a tag by Posen catch Avery Werth to score in the third inning of a baseball game on Wednesday in Posen.

POSEN–There was nothing fancy about anything the Alcona baseball team did on Wednesday.

The Tigers simply made contact at the plate, made the routine defensive plays and were aggressive on the bases.

Added all up it equaled two more wins for Alcona as the Tigers defeated Posen 12-8 and 13-0 (five innings) in a North Star League doubleheader in Posen.

In a matchup of two small ball teams, Alcona (20-8, 16-4 NSL) came out the winner after doing a lot of little things well.

“That’s what we’re really focusing on today is getting ourselves ready for the (district) tournament,” Alcona coach Terry Franklin said. “(We’re) playing some small ball and working on some things, running the bases well and putting the ball in play.”

In the nightcap, Alcona scored one run in both the second and third innings and added four more in the fourth after four Posen errors.

The Tigers scored seven more runs in the next inning, playing station to station baseball as Posen struggled to get outs. Jake Gallagher led off the inning with a double to kickstart Alcona’s turn at the plate, which included 13 batters. Alcona scored a run on a hit by pitch with the bases loaded and two more scored on bases-loaded fielders choice RBIs. In all, seven different Alcona players had an RBI in the inning.

“You’re going to need that coming down the line. It’s an important part of baseball and you’ve got to be able to execute it,” Franklin said of Alcona base running. “The more you do, the better you’re going to get at it.”

The Vikings struggled all day to make routine defensive plays and had one bad inning in each game that hurt their chances to win. The fifth inning of the nightcap saw them miss chances to get easy outs on routine ground balls and the previous inning was plagued by errors.

Offensively, Posen scattered four hits, stranded eight base runners and left the bases loaded in the fourth inning as Gallagher induced a ground ball from Jared Kamyszek.

Jared Sharpe and Andrew Hall led Posen (13-17) with two hits each. Mark Wisniewski took the loss for Posen after pitching into the fourth inning and Wyatt Romel and Ben Romel each spent some time on the mound in relief.

Erik Davey had two hits, an RBI and scored twice for Alcona and Gallagher had two hits and scored twice. Alex Stephenson earned the win, striking out three and walking three in four innings.

Alcona trailed 5-3 after three innings in the opener, but rallied back with eight runs over the next two innings to earn the win.

After a solid start, the Vikings were undone again by their defense, particularly in the top of the fifth inning as two errors and three passed balls helped the Tigers score six runs.

“It was a real frustrating day for us. Jared Sharpe pitched very well, pitched well enough to win the game, but we didn’t field the ball defensively behind him like we should have,” Posen coach Pat Kowalski said. “I give Alcona a lot of credit, they put the ball in play, they put the ball in play hard and they forced us to make the defensive plays and we didn’t.”

In the top of the fourth inning, Alcona loaded the bases after a double and a pair of errors, Matt Krisan scored on an error to make it 5-4 and Jake McFadden later scored the tying run after Posen failed on an attempt to turn a double play.

Gallagher, Krisan and Josh Kilbourn each had an RBI single in the inning, but the other three runs came on two errors and a passed ball, giving Alcona an 11-5 lead.

Alcona added a run in the sixth inning after Krisan hit a solo home run to center field.

Posen cut the lead to 11-7 in the bottom of the fifth inning after Sharpe drove in a run and Avery Werth advanced home on a single. After Krisan’s home run, Posen added one more run in the sixth as Kamyszek scored, but couldn’t mount enough for a rally.

Brock Franklin earned the win for Alcona, allowing three runs on four hits with four strikeouts and a walk over the last two innings.

Krisan led Alcona with three hits, three runs scored and two RBI.

Sharpe took the loss for Posen, pitching into the fifth inning before being relieved by Wisniewski.

Sharpe had two hits and three RBI for Posen and Darren Dubie had a hit and two RBI. Wisniewski had a hit and scored three runs.

After Posen scored a run in the first inning, Alcona answered back with three runs in the third inning to take a 3-1 lead. A two-single from Werth in the bottom of the third helped Posen take a 5-3 lead before Alcona knotted the game again in the fourth inning.

James Andersen can be reached via email at sports@thealpenanews.com or by phone at 358-5694. Follow James on Twitter @ja_alpenanews.

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