Cardinals exact some revenge

The St. Paul baseball team hosted Yoakum at the Shiner Starplex Monday night, hoping to exact revenge on the team that beat them in the Yoakum Tournament two weeks ago.

That revenge appears to be in serious jeopardy when the Bulldogs took a big lead early, but a furious Cardinal rally down the stretch gave St. Paul its revenge with a 7-6 white-knuckler.

Yoakum started the game strong, bringing in four runners in the first inning and two more in the third for what appeared to be a comfortable 6-0 Bulldog lead.

St. Paul was still down until the Cardinals began a small rally in the bottom of the fifth inning. With one out and two men aboard on walks, Dylan Barton laced an RBI single to finally put a run on the board. With another base on balls, the bases were juiced with Laddie Patek on third base, Barton on second, Cole Hybner at first, and Adam Hollenbach up to bat, looking to bring his teammates in.

And indeed he did.

Hollenbach chalked up two RBIs with a single, bringing in Patek and Barton. The Bulldogs finally stopped the bleeding for a 6-3 Yoakum lead.

The sixth frame went by quickly, with Yoakum recording only one hit in its half of the inning, and St. Paul going hitless.

However, it was the seventh and final inning of the game where the Cardinals began their tremendous comeback. Before doing so, they had to take care of business at the top of the frame. The first batter got on with a base on balls, before the next batter popped up to the pitcher for the first out. The runner on first was caught stealing for the second out, and the final out being a pop up caught by the catcher.

What happened next was yet another Cardinal rally to try to steal the win from the Bulldogs.

Barton started the inning with a double. Hybner followed with a double of his own, getting the RBI with Barton easily scoring. After a Hollenbach strikeout, Colby Schrade got an RBI base hit, narrowing the deficit to 6-5. Tyler Morgan got aboard with a single himself, then Tanner Davis snagged a game-tying RBI single and Dakota Kresta walked to load the bases.

That’s when Mitchell McElroy got the game-winning RBI, completing the comeback victory for St. Paul and a 7-6 victory.

The Cardinals take a break for a week, with their next scheduled game March 22 against San Antonio Winston.