Baseball: Rice Lake cruises past Superior, is walked off by Ashland

The Rice Lake baseball team split its two contests at Superior last week, routing Superior on Friday and falling in walk-off fashion to Ashland on Saturday.

Ashland 8, Rice Lake 7

The Warriors erased a five-run deficit in their final at-bats but the Oredockers got the walk-off win in the bottom of the seventh.

Rice Lake trailed 7-1 after five innings and 7-2 after six. In the top of the seventh the Warriors scored five times on two hits to even the score. A hit batter and two walks filled the bases with no outs, and Wyatt Kunesh drove in the first run on a sacrifice fly. Brady Musil and then Gavin Richter each had RBI singles to bring Rice Lake within two runs.

A walk loaded the bases but the Oredockers got a strikeout for the second out. Down to their final strike, the Warriors had Lucas Roux get hit by a pitch to make it 7-6, and then Easton Stone was also hit in the next at-bat for the fifth run of the frame and to even the score. A fly out ended the inning as Rice Lake stranded the bases loaded.

An error by the Warriors set up Ashland for the game-winning run. The runner moved to second on a ground out, which was the second out of the inning. Ashland's Cole Brinket then singled to right field to bring in the runner and end the game.

Rice Lake had five errors in the loss as just two of the eight runs that scored were earned runs for pitchers Roux and Richter. Musil led the offense in going 3 for 4 with an RBI. Kalvin Kelsey tripled and scored a run.

Rice Lake 14, Superior 4

Kunesh, Roux and Musil combined for 10 of the 15 hits as the Warriors rolled to a win over the Spartans.

The Warriors had four separate innings of three runs.

Kunesh was 4 for 5 with two RBIs, while Roux and Musil were each 3 for 4 and also drove in two runs. Roux scored three runs, while Tanner Koltunski, Stone, Kelsey and Aaron Hoffman each scored twice. Stone also drove in two runs and his double was the only extra-base hit.

Rice Lake also stole eight bases in the victory, including three from Kelsey and two from Jack Larson.

Kelsey got the start on the mound and tossed six innings with eight strikeouts. He gave up eight hits, three earned runs and walked one.