Senior Sox handle Kirkwood, Mo., behind Queck, Blankenship
EDITOR’S NOTE: In this time of COVID-19, with no sports action, BryantDaily.com will be posting past stories of Bryant athletics either posted on BryantDaily.com (from 2009 to the present) or published in the Bryant Times (from 1998 to 2008).
By Rob Patrick
MOUNTAIN HOME — For one reason or another, Austin Queck didn’t see a lot of varsity playing time for the Bryant Hornets high school team this spring. It was kind of a rough senior season.
So, it would be understandable that he might be looking forward to the summer and American Legion ball with more games and, he no doubt hoped, more opportunities.
That’s why Friday, June 12, had to be so sweet for the right-hander. In the final game of pool play at the 23rd annual Brooks Robinson-Lockeroom Twin Lakes Classic, Queck pitched five innings of two-hit shutout ball and picked up his first win on the mound for the Bryant Black Sox Senior American Legion team. The Sox completed a three-game sweep of their pool with a 6-1 win over the Kirkwood, Mo., Cardinals at Cooper Park.
Now 12-2, the Sox advance to the eight-team, single-elimination championship tournament. They were set to play at wild card team from one of the other pools on Saturday at 5 p.m. The semifinals and finals will be played on Sunday.[more]
Queck struck out five, walked a batter and hit another. He wound up surrendering three hits and was charged with the lone Kirkwood run when, in the sixth, he issued a lead-off walk and gave up a double to Jake Clifford. Kaleb Jobe came on in relief and struck out Dane Stole. He was a strike away from fanning Justin Fettig too but the Cards’ batter got enough of the 0-2 pitch to bounce it through the hole on the right side for an RBI single.
Jobe proceeded to pick off Clifford at third and finish the game by retiring four in a row, three on strikes.
“What can you say about Queck?” commented Sox manager Craig Harrison. “We asked him to get us deep in the game and he was able to give us five shutout innings. When he throws strikes and changes speeds, he is effective. Now, we’ve won the pool and we still have Trent (Daniel) and Saw (Tyler Sawyer) that haven’t thrown an inning. We’ll go at it tomorrow and see if we can press forward to Sunday.”
Offensively, the Sox were sparked by lead-off man Justin Blankenship. He and Ben Wells each had two hits. But Blankenship led off the game with a solo homer and wound up with three RBIs.
In the second, singles by Trent Daniel and Wells then a walk to B.J. Ellis set the table. With one out, Blankenship drew a free pass from Kirkwood starter Michael Lindblad, forcing in a run. Caleb Garrett’s sacrifice fly made it 3-0.
Queck, who had pitched around a walk and a one-out double by Drew Schlereth in the first by getting Clifford to foul out to Ellis, the Bryant catcher, then fanning Stole. He worked a 1-2-3 second with the help of a nice short-hop play at third by Jobe.
In the top of the third, Jobe cracked a double that Kirkwood left fielder Caleb Harris lost in the lights. Brady Butler was hit by a pitch and Daniel walked to load the bases. Lindblad gave way to another lefty Rob Dicken who, with one out, hit Ellis to force in a run that made it 4-0.
Queck issued a walk and hit a batter with two down in the bottom of the inning. Clifford followed with a long drive down the right-field line that looked destined for extra bases. But Blankenship raced into the corner and flagged it down in front of the fence to end the inning with the shutout still intact.
The right-hander retired the side in order in the fourth and pitched around a two-out double by Sam Hellwege in the fifth after the Sox tacked on two more to the lead in the top of the fifth.
In that uprising, Wells smacked a one-out single and, with two down, Austin Benning ripped a double into the left-field corner. Wells was able to score all the way from first on the play. A pitch later, Blankenship sliced a single to left-center that plated Benning to make it 6-0.
Dicken shut down the Sox after that, retiring seven of the last eight batters. Ellis, who walked with two out in the seventh, was the lone batter to reach.
“We got a little cushion and then we took the night off, it seemed,” Harrison commented. “But we did enough to get the win. We had a couple of opportunities to really break the game open, but we didn’t and that’s sometimes the way it goes.”
BRYANT 6, KIRKWOOD, MO. 1
Black Sox ab r h bi Cardinals ab r h bi
Blankenship, rf 3 1 2 3 Hellwege, ss 2 0 1 0
Garrett, cf 2 0 0 1 Richardson, 2b 3 0 0 0
Sawyer, ss 4 0 0 0 Schlereth, 3b 1 1 1 0
Jobe, 3b-p 3 1 1 0 Clifford, 1b 3 0 1 0
Butler, 1b 3 0 0 0 Stole, dh 3 0 0 0
Daniel, dh 3 1 1 0 Fettig, rf 3 0 1 1
Wells, 1b 4 2 2 0 Rugaber, c 3 0 0 0
Ellis, c 1 0 0 1 Harris, lf 3 0 0 0
Clark, cr 0 0 0 0 Wiggins, cf 3 0 0 0
Benning, 2b 4 1 1 1 Lindblad, p 0 0 0 0
Queck, p 0 0 0 0 Dicken, p 0 0 0 0
Wade, 3b 0 0 0 0
Totals 27 6 7 6 Totals 24 1 4 1
BRYANT 121 020 0 — 6
Kirkwood 000 001 0 — 1
E—Clifford. LOB—Bryant 9, Kirkwood 6. 2B—Schlereth, Jobe, Benning, Hellwege, Clifford. HR—Blankenship. SB—Blankenship 2, Garrett. SF—Garrett.
Pitching ip r er h bb so
Bryant
Queck (W) 5 1 1 3 3 5
Jobe 2 0 0 1 0 4
Kirkwood
Lindblad (L) 2 4 4 4 4 2
Dicken 5 2 2 3 2 5
Lindblad faced three batters in the third.
Queck faced two batters in the sixth.
HBP—Butler (by Lindblad), Ellis (by Dicken), Schlereth (by Queck). WP—Dicken.
