Scott City baseball team defeats Malden, busts through sectional roadblock

MALDEN, Mo. -- A day short of the one-year anniversary of the game that has both haunted and motivated the Scott City baseball team, the Rams got another shot to reach the Class 3 state quarterfinals.

"We've been waiting 365 days for this," Scott City coach Jim May said with a larger smile than he usually allows himself after his team defeated Malden 8-6 in a state sectional Monday afternoon.

The Rams will host West County in the quarterfinal round at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Scott City won its third consecutive district title last week, but Monday was the first time it got a victory in the sectional round.

Last year's game, which Scott City hosted against New Madrid County Central, ended in confusion, controversy and ultimately heartbreak for the Rams when catcher's interference of all things was called on an attempted squeeze play in the bottom of the seventh.

"Last year left a pretty bitter taste in our mouths when we lost right there at the end on a squeeze play 2-1," May said. "Then New Madrid went on to the final four, which they're a good team just like Malden. We always face a good team coming out of this district. It's nice to finally come out with a win."

The Rams met last summer and set a goal of reaching the final four this season then went to work becoming a better offensive team, something that has been a key to their success, according to May.

Scott City was the first team on the board Monday. Sophomore Dylan Keller walked to lead off the top of the second and should have been stranded when a textbook double play ball drew Malden shortstop Mason Brown toward second base. Instead, the ball slipped through his legs and Keller and Ty Wilthong both later scored on Hunter Copeland's RBI infield single. Brown fielded Copeland's hit but threw a catchable one-hopper to first that skipped by the bag, allowing Wilthong to score on the error.

The lead was short-lived. Freshman pitcher Dakota Talley gave up a walk, a single and a two-RBI double to Connor Murphy to start the bottom of the second. He retired the next two batters before shortstop Braden Cox's error allowed a run to score and kept the inning alive for lead-off batter Shaeen Perkins, whose RBI single gave Malden a 4-2 lead.

Talley then picked Perkins off first to end the inning.

"It was a big momentum switch for us, and we've been in that situation a lot. Our record doesn't look like we're the greatest team on the face of the earth, but we play a really hard schedule," May said about his 19-12 team. "We've been in one- and two-run games all season long against good competition. That's why we do that. That's why we play those games so when we get a situation like this we know how to handle it and we know what we've got to do. We were lucky enough to make it happen today."

The momentum shift combined with more Malden errors -- of both the fielding and mental variety -- helped Scott City gain the lead for good in the top of the third.

The Rams scored five times to go up 7-4 on just three hits and three more errors. Two other times the Green Wave tried to get outs at bases other than first and failed.

"In this game you've got to get outs when you can get outs, and that was three times I can think of we didn't do that, and they all led to runs," said Malden coach Tim Harmon, who said his team "never recovered" from that inning.

Trent Pobst, whose two hits on the day made him Scott City new single-season record holder for hits with 48, extended the Rams' lead with an RBI single in the top of the fifth.

"Trent's just a good hitter," said May, noting that the junior left fielder has struck out just three times this season while batting above .500. "Even with two strikes, he's going to put the ball in play. He can hit the ball to all fields, and he hits the ball hard every time up there and good things happen.

Malden (24-6) cut the lead to 8-6 with two runs in the bottom of the fifth on Dee Triplett's two-RBI single. Talley got a foul out from Parker McCormick to end what could have been a bigger inning, according to Harmon.

"I thought we had a chance in the fifth inning when we had first and second, one out with [Chapen] Riley up, our three-hole hitter -- somebody we want," Harmon said. "He had a 2-0 count and he kind of swung at a ball up and out of the strike zone and popped up to first base. That stood out to me. Other than that we didn't play well enough to win. I'm not taking anything away from Scott City. We didn't deserve to win, the way we played."

Scott City missed an opportunity to add some insurance in the top of the seventh with two on and one out then had to face the top of the Malden lineup in the bottom of the inning.

Freshman reliever Bryan McNeely, who entered at the start of the sixth, got two groundouts to start the inning then allowed a hit and walk after being ahead 0-2 on Triplett before McCormick grounded back to him to end it.

May said it was an easy choice to put Talley and McNeely on the mound in Rams' biggest game of the season. Their ability to pitch the complete game means sophomore ace Braden Cox will be fresh for the quarterfinal.

"Those two freshmen have been doing it for us all year long," he said. "Talley's pitched against Cooter, he's pitched against Malden, he's played a lot of tough teams. I don't even consider them freshmen anymore. I just consider them two of our better pitchers. I can count on them. They're going to give us a chance to get a win."

The starting matchup of Talley and Malden's Jeremy Jones was a rematch of an April 11 contest, which Scott City won 5-4 at Malden.

"I wasn't that nervous. Having pitched to them before, I knew I could beat them," Talley said. "I knew I could keep them off balance -- they'd pop up a lot of balls that I threw, so I knew I could get a lot of flyouts and groundouts."

Scott City sophomore Dylan Keller, who was 3 for 3 with a walk and an RBI, said Jones had a "sick knuckleball."

"You've got to hit his fastball because he's got nasty off-speed [pitches]," Keller said.

Keller is one of the standouts in three sports for Scott City, which has had a youth movement across all varsity sports in recent years. Even now just one senior starts for the Rams.

"Like I said, they're unfazed," May said. "Most of them play football, basketball and baseball, and so they've been in varsity situations for basically two years as a sophomore already because we've been young in all three sports, and it's paying dividends."

Scott City 025 010 0 -- 8 12 2

Malden 040 020 0 -- 6 9 5

WP -- Dakota Talley. LP -- Jeremy Jones. 2B -- Connor Murphy (M). Multiple hits -- Scott City: Braden Cox 2-3, Trent Pobst 2-4, Dylan Keller 3-3, Caden Hillemann 2-4; Malden: Shaeen Perkins 2-4, B. Stanley 2-3.