Gladstone Braves Outlast Young Negaunee Miners

Click the thumbnails above to see photos and videos taken by Dylan Pepin and Carter Vanbrocklin. Also see/hear post-game interviews with Mason LaChance, Aedan Creten, Coach Lucas Lacosse, and Braden Sundquist.

NEGAUNEE---The Gladstone High School baseball team bounced back from Tuesday's extra inning loss in Menominee by taking two games from the Negaunee Miners on Wednesday, 7-2 and 11-7, at Iron Town Field.

The Miners hung in there despite having a roster with no seniors and ten freshmen. The Braves, too, had a young line-up, especially in the second game when Manager Lucas Lacosse chose to start many of his younger players. Neither team has a JV club this spring.

Gladstone won the first game largely because of a four-run fourth inning after Negaunee had taken a brief 2-1 lead. The second game saw the Braves build an 8-2 lead before the Miners made a late charge that saw them have the tying run at the plate in the final inning.

In the opener, Carter Vanbrocklin led off with a double in the first inning and scored on a hit by Braden Sundquist. The Miners tied the game in the second inning on a solo home run by Brenten Belanger over the left field fence. It was his second hit in as many days.

In the third inning, Owen Debelak was safe on an error to start the inning and scored on a two-out single by Keith Judici. But the Braves came back with four runs in thr fourth inning, with two of them scoring on a squeeze bunt by Mason LaChance, and the other two coming home on a two-out base hit from Cam Kelly.

Gladstone put the game away with two more runs in the fifth inning, with one scoring on a balk and the other coming home on an RBI single by LaChance.

Sundquist and Van Brocklin both had two hits in theat game for the Braves. VamBrocklin earned the win on the mound, pitching four innings, allowing two runs (one earned) on five hits. Austin Bagwell pitched two 1-2-3 innings to finish up on the hill.

Negaunee starter Gerald Johnson got a no-decision after being pulled with two innings of pitching. He allowed one run on two hits and two walks. Debelak, one of the many Miners freshmen, took the loss, after allowing the four-run fourth inning.

In the second game, both managers played a lot of their younger players. The game was tied at 2-2 in the third inning when Aedan Creten smacked a home run over the right field fence, his first homer as a Brave. Then the Braves scored four runs during a bat-around fourth inning, with pitcher John Soderman helping his own cause with an RBI single and Sundquist contributing a two-run base hit. That made it an 8-2 game.

The Miners scored three runs in the fifth inning to close to within 8-5, but the Braves got the runs back in the top of the sixth with RBI hits by Payton Gingras (off the bench) and Soderman's RBI shot to left field. He was on base four times (two hits, two walks).

Negaunee made a late charge in the bottom of the sixth as Howard Johnson and Judici had back-to-back run-scoring hits. But Sundquist came on to pitch with the bases loaded in an 11-7 game and struck out Belanger on a 3-2 pitch, then got Debelak to fly out to end the game.

Soderman earned the win on the hill for Gladstome, throwing four-plus innings, allowimg five runs on five hits and three walks. Bagwell pitched for the second time in the doubleheader and managed to go 1 1/3 innings, allowing two runs, before Sundquist got the save.

Negaunee, which used four pitchers in the opener, used three more in the nightcap. Judici took the loss, allowing four runs on three hits in three innings of work.

Gladstone improved to 13-7 on the season while Negaunee fell to 2-21.