Article Photos

Fact Box

Boone 252 30-12 9 0

Webster City 000 00- 0 0 6

Blane Reutter (W, 4 IP, 1 BB, 9 SO), Mike Dahl (1 IP, 0 BB, 0 SO) and Erik Phipps. Corbin Kehoe (L, 1 1/3 IP, 5 BB, 0 SO), Jonny Davis (2 IP, 3 BB, 3 SO), Sam Mossman (1 2/3 IP, 2 BB, 1 SO) and Daniel Stoakes. 2B-BO: Dahl. 3B-BO: Cole Wigert. Multiple RBI-BO: Greg Hilsabeck (2).

Advertisement

BOONE - If only the outcome would have come down to a coin flip, then maybe Webster City would have had a chance. But baseball just doesn't work that way.

The arbitrary flip of the coin to see which team got to pick the visiting and home teams on the scoreboard was the one and only thing that went the Lynx way Friday night, as their season ended with a thud against Boone in a Class 3A District 4 semifinal-round game.

It took the Toreadors (18-12) just one-half of an inning to turn Webster City's dugout into a morgue. They put up two runs in their first at bat to take the lead for good, and they tacked on multiple runs in four frames in a 12-0, 5-inning rout of the Lynx at Memorial Park.

"I'm shocked, I really am," Webster City head coach Seth McGrane said just minutes after the final pitch. "I was ready to be here until 11:30 (p.m.) because I thought it was going to be an extra-inning battle. But we just weren't very mentally tough."

Boone pitchers Blane Reutter and Mike Dahl faced the minimum number of batters and combined to no-hit the Lynx - the fourth time this season that Webster City (11-19) has seen its bats stay completely silent.

Reutter - a senior southpaw and a first-team all-state pitcher a year ago - finished with nine strikeouts in four innings. He fanned the first six Lynx batters and eight during his first journey through the order by painting the outside corner with his above-average fastball and hard-breaking slider. Only Sam Mossman avoided the punch-out when he laid down a bunt. Jonny Davis was the only other batter to put the ball in play against Reutter with a fourth-inning fly-out to right field.

Reutter's lone blemish was a walk to Dalton Keane in the fourth, but he quickly corrected his own mistake by picking Keane off first.

"(Reutter's) the best pitcher we've seen this year, and we weren't able to do much," McGrane said. "He mixed up his pitches well and he changed locations a lot. He was tough."

Dahl retired the side in his one inning of work in the fifth.

Webster City compounded its own problems by committing six fielding errors, which led to six Boone runs. The Toreadors lashed nine hits and were the recipients of 10 walks issued by Lynx pitchers Corbin Kehoe, Davis and Mossman.

Greg Hilsabeck lined a two-out single to center off Kehoe in the first inning to push the first run across the plate, and falling in a 2-0 hole before it even stepped to the plate seized any momentum that Webster City hoped to have.

"We let two runs and a couple of errors get us down," McGrane said. "We're just disappointed with the way we played because we really felt like we had a shot."

Any shot the Lynx did have vanished completely in the second inning, as Boone pushed five more runs across to vault to a 7-0 lead. Kehoe, the Lynx starter on the mound, was yanked after giving up a RBI double to Dahl and three straight walks.

Kehoe lasted just 1 1/3 innings before handing the ball over the Davis. He allowed just three hits, but he walked five and threw four wild pitches.

"Corbin will bounce back from this next year," McGrane said of the junior who is the ace of the pitching staff. "(Boone) hits the ball up and down the lineup, and it would have been tough for any of our pitchers to stop them."

Davis was promptly greeted by a Cole Wigert triple down the right field line in the second inning. Davis lasted two innings on the hill and Sam Mossman closed it out over the final 1 2/3 innings.

Dahl went 3-for-5, scored two runs and drove in another at the top of the Toreadors' order. No. 2 hitter Ryan Titman was 2-for-4 with a RBI, and Hilsabeck collected two RBI.

A state semifinalist a year ago, Boone will attempt to move one step closer to a return trip to Des Moines Monday night when it hosts Ballard in the district final. The Bombers were 5-1 winners over Nevada in the other district semifinal on Friday.