BOURBON -ÊTippecanoe Valley baseball coach Scott Backus was happy to leave Triton with a 4-3 win Monday night. After all, the game could have gone either way.

"It's nice to be on this (winning) side of things," said Backus. "Last year we lost a lot of games like this. Now we are playing good baseball and we want to win. We believe we can win."

Triton struck first blood in the game. In the bottom of the first inning, Tyson Blackford, Daniel Kuhn and Tyler Hensley each walked to load the bases. After Blackford crossed home plate, Triton held a 1-0 advantage.

"(Pitcher) Drew Deardorff struggled early, walking in a run in the first, but he settled down and threw strikes the rest of the way," said Backus.

The Vikings tied the game at 1-all after manufacturing a run in the second inning. Mike Schwenk reached first on a walk. Then Wes Backus reached first on an error at the second base position, and Schwenk moved to third on the play.

A sacrifice fly to right field by B.J. Cunningham sent Schwenk across the plate to knot the score at 1.

Valley then came back in the fourth to score three more runs. Drew Deardorff and Schwenk each walked to reach base. A Backus single juiced the bases, and B.J. Cunningham got his second RBI of the contest when he was hit by a pitch, sending Deardorff home.

Walks by both Richie Swanson and Chris Mitterling sent Schwenk and Backus across the plate and gave Valley a 4-1 lead going into the bottom of the fourth inning.

"We took advantage of some errors and walks to jump up 4-1 in the fourth," said Backus.

The Trojans made a game of it in the fifth by scoring two more runs. Blackford reached base on an error at third. Landon Grubbs got to first on an error by the shortstop that allowed Blackford to score. Then a ball hit by Hager Holbrook scored Grubbs to make the score 4-3 in Valley's favor.

"We had two outs in the fifth and Phil Jackson (shortstop) and Jeremiah Haney (centerfield) collided on a shallow fly ball to left," said Backus. "The ball popped out, and instead of it being out number three, we gave them two runs. We settled down and made the plays that we needed to make to get away with the win."

Both Valley's and Triton's defenses went to work in the final two innings. No runs were scored through the sixth and seventh innings, and Valley took home the 4-3 victory.

"I was a bit disappointed with our play at times," said Backus. "We were not communicating at times, and we made some silly errors."

The Vikings improve to 3-1-1 on the season and will host Northfield in a non-conference game Wednesday. Triton falls to 1-2 and will host Caston Wednesday.

TIPPECANOE VALLEY 4

TRITON 3

Tippecanoe Valley AB R H RBI

Sausaman 4 0 0 0

Jackson 4 0 0 0

Deardorff 3 1 2 0

Schwenk 2 2 1 0

Backus 4 1 1 0

Cunningham 2 0 0 2

Shewman 3 0 0 0

Swanson 1 0 0 1

Mitterling 2 0 0 1

Totals 25 4 3 4

Triton AB R H RBI

Blackford 4 2 0 0

Kuhn 3 0 0 0

Hensley 3 0 0 0

Grubbs 3 1 1 0

Holbrook 2 0 1 1

Watkins 3 0 0 0

Potter 3 0 1 0

Norman 3 0 0 0

Burnett 3 0 0 0

Totals 27 3 3 1

Valley (3-1-1) 010 300 0 - 4 4 2

Triton (1-2) 100 020 0 - 3 3 5

DP -ÊValley 1, Triton 0. LOB -ÊValley 6, Triton 6. 2B - Grubbs. SB -ÊPotter, Hensley, Blackford, Backus. Sac -ÊCunningham.

IP H R ER BB SO

Valley

Deardorff, W, 1-0 6 3 3 0 4 4

Cunningham, S 1 0 0 0 0 2

Triton

Burnett, L 3.1 1 4 3 3 2

Savill 0 0 0 0 2 0

Hensley 3.2 3 0 0 1 2

Savill pitched to two batters in the fourth.

WP -ÊDeardorff. Balk -ÊBurnett. HB -ÊBurnett. [[In-content Ad]]