Post 320 15, Sturgis 9

Post 320 second baseman Cory Weidmann fires to first for a double-play against Sturgis Thursday afternoon. The Stars ended the Titians season with a 15-9 win. (Photo Sonja Erickson/IDS)

Head coach Jim Brandt was promised at least one more game at the helm of Rapid City Post 320.

The Stars jumped out to a giant lead after two and a half innings. They weathered a half-hour lightning delay, a comeback from a veteran Sturgis Post 33 team that didn’t want to be finished just yet, and their own carelessness in the field and on the mound.

But in the end they prevailed against the Titans to ensure that their skipper’s career kept going.

Sparked by nine runs in their first three innings, Post 320 smacked 18 hits all around Fitzgerald Stadium to outlast Sturgis in a three-hour plus Region 3A elimination game.

Centerfielder Matt Johnson was 3-for-6 with two RBI and a double. Corey Weidmann had three singles with an RBI, and Kyle Gorsuch had a double and a triple with two RBI. Tanner Feterl, Hunter LaCroix, Danny Bareis and Jake Fredericksen each had two hits apiece.

It appeared the rout was on after the Stars made it 9-0 heading into the bottom half. Post 320 had four straight hits, highlighted by an RBI double from Johnson and run-scoring hits from Weidmann and Bareis. A Sturgis error allowed two more runs to come home to cap off the six-run third.

(Photos Sonja Erickson/IDS)

Then the lightning came.

The delay slowed the momentum of the Stars and Sturgis seized it immediately.

Sturgis’ Kyle Hencke made their first hit of the game off Bryce Mitzel a biggie, blasting a two-run dinger over the left field wall to put Sturgis on the board.

The next inning Hencke again delivered the clutch hit with a two-run double. The play may have  resulted in only one run, but Johnson was blinded by the sun in center and couldn’t pick up the ball until it was well on its way to the wall. Sturgis would plate another to make it 9-5.

Two runs for Post 320 in the fifth slowed the Titan momentum, and three more in the sixth nearly halted it as the Stars held a 14-5 lead.

But Brandt told IDS after the game that “those last six innings were not a relaxing situation” for a reason.

Sturgis, largely aided by walks and errors by 320, scored two runs in the sixth and eighth to cut the lead to five.

They were threatening to score even more in the eighth before Trace Steckler was brought in with the bases loaded and no outs. Steckler did about as good as you can do given the situation, getting two groundouts and a strikeout while allowing just one run.

“(Steckler)’s been in every game so far in the regional,” Brandt said. “He’s come a million miles. He didn’t play a lot last year, but he’s coming. And you might see him again (tonight).”

In the ninth Steckler struck out one and picked off another to close the door on Sturgis’ season.