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MENTONE - It seemed like the Tippecanoe Valley Vikings had the odds stacked against them in the baseball season opener Wednesday against the Caston Comets.
After all, the Vikings were without their leadoff and cleanup hitters because of spring break. Also, Valley was playing just its first game of the season compared to Caston's third. Then, there was the mental factor. Over the past couple of years, Caston has always seemed to have just enough to beat Valley.
So, there was Valley trailing 1-0 in the bottom of the fifth. The Vikings surely looked as if the loss of those two hitters was hurting them with only four hits through the first four innings. However, Valley rallied for four runs in the inning and came away with a 4-2 win to drop Caston to 1-2 on the year.
Valley head coach Pat O'Connell saw his team claw away a victory despite an offense that struggled to put together clutch hits with runners in scoring position. The Vikings found a way to win anyway.
"When you look for ways to win, you usually look for walks and errors," O'Connell said. "Caston had seven critical errors."
Those errors, along with five walks, were Caston's downfall especially in the four-run fifth inning.
After Jason Smith grounded out to open the fifth inning, R.J. Hutchison reached on an error. Cameron Vanlaningham then walked, and Brent Bouser singled to load the bases. It would be the only base hit of the inning for Valley.
After Aaron Hart struck out, it looked as if the Vikings would once again come away from an inning leaving runners stranded. Valley had left eight runners on base to that point.
But Orville Haney lofted a high fly ball toward left fielder Wes Scott. Scott struggled to get under the ball and fell to the grass before making a valiant attempt to make the catch. However, the ball dropped out of his glove and three Valley baserunners scored. Luke Gibson followed that up by plating Haney when Caston shortstop Josh Olinger mishandled a grounder to score the fourth run of the inning.
Those four runs were plenty for the Vikings, but Caston did make it interesting in the seventh.
Valley went errorless through the first six innings, but things began to fall apart in the final inning.
Caston's Greg Byrum reached base on an error by the shortstop and scored on a single from Olinger and a throwing error by the right fielder. But Greg Zimpleman grounded out to the second baseman, Chris Phelps popped out to second, and Charlie Baldwin struck out after a walk to end the threat.
"We had four subs in there in the seventh, and it broke up the routine," O'Connell said. "All four of our subs are probably JV players."
Brent Bouser was the only Valley player with multiple hits in the game. He went 2 for 3 and scored a run. Matt Bose pitched three innings, allowing three hits, striking out four and picking up the win. Hutchison came on to get the save.
Valley (1-0) will play in the Elkhart Memorial Tournament on Saturday at 10 a.m.
