A trio of scheduled American Legion games for Merrill was reduced to one due to the Stevens Point’s state tournament conflict and last Thursday’s storm.
They did manage to play in Marshfield on Monday, despite more inclement conditions, and lost a 12-4 contest.
“We played a solid game for five innings,” Merrill manager John Annis said. “Then it came down to pitchers not throwing strikes, and we had a few mental error in the field, not hitting the cut-offs. You can’t give teams like Marshfield an extra 90 feet. But even with the errors and mental errors, we made some pretty solid plays to get out of jams.
“As a whole, we kind of ran out of gas. We need to play a complete game.”
Post 46 scored 3 in the 5th for a 3-1 lead, aided by a 2-run double from Luke Golisch. Tom Zuelsdorff and Garrett Pagel had singled to lead off the inning, and Ben Anderson walked to load the bases for Golisch. A passed ball allowed Zuelsdorff to score before Golisch’s rip.
But Marshfield bounced back with 6 in the bottom of the 6th, then tacked on 5 more in the 7th.
Merrill did manage another run in the 8th, with help from an error, a wild pitch, a Dylan Schielke sacrifice grounder and a Trevor Pike RBI sac fly.
Anderson hit 4-4 with a walk, and Golisch doubled twice in a 2-5 performance as Merrill finished with 9 hits.
Post 46 threw a crew of 5 pitchers. Jahnke (5 H, 2 W, 3 K, 1 R in 4 I) started and Colton Bloch, Tristan Schultz, Jake Hassel and Schielke finished up.
Marshfield banged out 14 hits and 7 walks.
“They’ve got guys that can hit the ball and they have a decent pitching staff,” Annis said. “Their two guys kept us off-balance.”
Sully Luepke returned from college to pitch 7 innings.
Merrill is 1-1 on the season.