For the second straight season, Russellville ends NB baseball’s season in district semis

ASHLAND -- Taking on their rival, the Class 2 No. 4 Russellville Indians, in the Class 2 District 8 tournament semifinals for the second straight season, the New Bloomfield Wildcats lost by three fewer runs with a younger team this season.

Second-seeded Russellville won 2-0 against No. 3 seed New Bloomfield Tuesday at Southern Boone High School. The game was initially scheduled for Monday at Rod Haley Field but was moved due to New Bloomfield's grass field conditions.

Neither team allowed a walk, while both had an error, but Russellville outhit New Bloomfield 6-5. Future Missouri Tiger Charlie Miller notched a game-high two hits, going 2-3 with two singles and an RBI for the Indians.

Miller put Russellville in front early, lining a two-out RBI single to right in the bottom of the first.

Three innings later, the Indians added an insurance run when Davin Pistel grounded a two-out RBI single to left.

Eli Bailey didn't pitch in the Wildcats' first two meetings against Russellville this season and took the complete-game loss Tuesday. The freshman allowed two runs (all earned) on six hits and no walks while striking out three in six innings.

Brendon Carter, Eli Bailey, Chase Bailey, Brayden Carroll and Andrew Fouch tallied a single apiece for the Wildcats.

Nolan Gartner's double in the fourth for Russellville accounted for the game's only extra-base hit.

While both teams had quality pitching, a future Power 5 baseball player's offense was enough for Russellville (24-8) to end its rival's season.

With only two seniors on its team, New Bloomfield went 8-17, tallying the same amount of wins while ending its season in the district semifinals like last season.

"Game was played in 1 hour and 10 minutes," New Bloomfield coach Justin Forsythe said. "Eli Bailey had six great innings and did his job by keeping us in the ball game all day. We played a clean game, had opportunities just didn't get the big hit or string hits together.

"Really proud of the way our guys battle today; we gave ourself an opportunity to win; things just didn't go our way today. Thank you to our two seniors, Brendon Carter and Dorian Meyer, for four years of hard work and dedication to the New Bloomfield baseball program."

"We were a very young group playing a lot of veteran teams this spring; we took some lumps, battle a really tough schedule, but kept getting better. This year of experience is really going to pay off next year for this group."