The Shawano American Legion baseball team struggled on defense against division-leading Menasha, losing 9-2 Wednesday at Memorial Park in Shawano.
“They’re a good team,” Shawano coach Will Gillis said. “They’re at the top of the league for a reason. They don’t make many errors at all. We had quite a few tonight, some mental, some physical. Physical errors you can excuse, but the mental ones, those are tough to overcome sometimes.”
Menasha (14-7, 10-1 FRV-West) has lone possession atop the Fox River Valley-West Division. Shawano (10-5, 8-4) is in second place.
After falling behind 3-1, Shawano threatened to tie the game in the fourth. Mason Boogren got a base hit, Clint Dallas drew a walk and both advanced on a sacrifice bunt by Jaryd Wilber. After Zack Sousek grounded out for the second out, Ky Schmidt popped out to the third basemen to end the inning.
From there Menasha pulled away.
Shawano had a lead early when Boogren scored in the second inning after reaching on a fielder’s choice, getting to second a Dallas base hit and scoring when Wilber hit a single to deep left field.
Menasha went ahead in the third on Josiah Boucher’s RBI double and Nathan Jack’s RBI single. Kelvin Medrano scored another run for Menasha in the fourth after hitting a triple and scoring on an error.
Nathan Jack had an RBI triple and Griffin Jack had an RBI single in the fifth to extend Menasha’s lead to 5-1.
In the bottom of the frame, Chase Henning, who was 2 for 3 to lead Shawano, sent a rocket over the left center field fence, but that was all Shawano could manage the rest of the way.
“Chase had a couple of good at bats tonight,” Gillis said. “They throw him a lot of curve balls. The secret is out on Chase. When he gets deep in counts and forces guys to throw him the fast ball, he can hit it a mile.”
Menasha added another run in the sixth on a sacrifice bunt by Jordan Schmidt after Tommy Stueck replaced Boogren on the mound.
Boogren allowed six runs on six hits, struck out two and walked four in five innings of work. Stueck allowed two runs on two hits, struck out two and walked two in two innings.
“Mason is our top reliever,” Gillis said. “I threw him in there because he really hasn’t gotten a lot of innings. He really threw well. We just didn’t give him the kind of support on defense that we should have. That’s too bad because he threw well.”
Later in the sixth, a base hit by Boucher brought in two more, and another run scored on a wild pitch to give Menasha a 9-2 advantage.
Richard Vanden Branden went the distance for Menasha, allowing two runs on eight hits. He struck out four and walked two.
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