Chaffee's baseball season ends with 4-3 upset in district

~ Jefferson upended the top-seeded Devils in the Class 2 District 3 baseball tournament

CHAFFEE, Mo. -- The Chaffee baseball team gave up 25 runs in 25 games leading up to Monday's Class 2 District 3 semifinal against Jefferson.

It gave up four runs in the sixth inning to the Blue Jays, which eventually led to its fourth loss and a heartbreaking end to an impressive season for the top-seeded Red Devils.

No. 3 hitter Cody Payne grounded out to second base with the bases loaded in the bottom of the seventh inning for the final out in Chaffee's 4-3 loss.

"If you could've hand-picked a guy we wanted at the plate, it was him, and not only with a chance to tie it but to win it with the bases loaded," Chaffee coach Brian Horrell said.

"It was nice to see us battle back and get an opportunity. In sports, that's all you can ask for a lot of times is just an opportunity for success, and we had a great opportunity to pull it out still. Just got to give them credit. They made the play."

Payne started on the mound for Chaffee and pitched out of trouble early with a little help from his defense.

Chaffee center fielder Daniel Dooley threw out a runner at the plate to end the top of the second inning, and Payne struck out back-to-back batters with the bases loaded in the third to keep the game scoreless.

"Usually he has great control with his offspeed pitches, and he struggled for at least three or four innings trying to find his offspeed stuff," Horrell said about Payne. "That's usually what makes him so effective is he throws three pitches, and he finally got them working there in the fourth and the fifth. Things were going well and he started the sixth with what you don't want -- a leadoff walk. Things just went south from there."

Payne walked No. 4 hitter Michael Alexander with the game still scoreless to start the sixth. Jefferson followed with back-to-back hits, the second of which plated the game's first run.

Jefferson's Dylan Newcomer then bunted with runners on first and second. Chaffee first baseman Alex Davie charged and fielded the ball cleanly but overthrew third base, which allowed two more runs to score.

"We was going to try to play aggressive, get the lead runner, and everything looked like it was going well," Horrell said. We got a hard-bunted ball to our defense, and it looked like we had plenty of time. Just unfortunately our throw was off just a little bit and it led to two more unearned runs."

Jefferson added its fourth run on an RBI single by Jared Schneider later in the inning.

The Chaffee offense had produced just one hit off Jefferson's Brock Boeckstiegel through its first five at-bats.

"We've faced kids like him before this year, and we've hit them well," Payne said. "It's just we came out and just didn't have our best game, I guess."

Boeckstiegel is an underclassman like everyone else on the Jefferson roster. The school was founded three years ago, and the school's oldest students are now juniors.

"He competes. He's won some big games for us this year," Jefferson coach Ross Koenig said about the sophomore.

Boeckstiegel struck out just three batters over 6 2/3 innings, but he walked only one.

Dooley and Payne got back-to-back hits with one out in the bottom of the sixth inning. Dooley scored on Trevor Cannon's ground out before Payne was thrown out trying to score on a wild pitch.

Davie, who entered the game for Payne in the sixth, pitched a scoreless seventh. Davie then was hit by a pitch to start the bottom of the inning.

Senior Alex Crowe followed with a double.

"Glad to see our kids fight back," Horrell said. "That showed a lot of character and class. The kids obviously didn't want to lose. They was going to tough it out."

Davie's courtesy runner scored on a ground out to cut the lead to 4-2.

Crowe scored on a sacrifice fly by Layton Tenkhoff to trim the lead to 4-3 but also left the bases empty with two outs.

Devon Yahn singled to chase Boeckstiegel, and the Red Devils loaded the bases with another hit and a walk. Jefferson's defense then retired Payne to end the game.

"That was a big win," Koenig said. "We've had a couple big wins here and there, but obviously with it being district play, that's the biggest win of the year."

Chaffee finished the season 22-4.

"For 25 games you couldn't ask for better defense all year and pitching," Horrell said. "We gave up two runs or less all year. We knew that was our strength coming in, and unfortunately we just picked a bad time to have a hiccup defensively."

Jefferson 000 004 0 -- 4 8 1

Chaffee 000 001 2 -- 3 6 2

WP -- Brock Boeckstiegel. LP -- Cody Payne. 2B -- Tristen Walsh (J), Payne (C), Alex Crowe (C). Multiple hits -- Jefferson: Boeckstiegel 2-4, Jared Schneider 2-4.