Tri-County South 13-year-old ballplayer Dan Waldschmi…

By Mark Adkins

T-C team opens state play Friday

Tri-County South 13-year-old ballplayer Dan Waldschmidt will soon know what his father and coach, Paul, went through when he played on a state tournament bound Babe Ruth team.

After the T-C South team captured the first District 4 title in the five years of its existence Sunday afternoon at Riverside, Dan walked up to his father, gave him a big hug and said “Dad, now I’m just as good of a ballplayer as you were.”

Paul responded by saying “Dan, you’re a better player than I was at your age.”

“It is kind of strange and neat for me to be in this position,” Paul Waldschmidt said. “I now have a son playing on this team after what I went through in winning the state title and playing in the Midwest regionals when I was his age.

“Myself and coach (Al) Coblentz are very proud of these kids,” he added. “I feel like we can make some noise at Newton, too.”

The district title was completed with a 7-5 win over Tri-County North East Sunday afternoon. After holding a 3-0 lead after one inning, South trailed for their first and only time all weekend as North East scored three times in the third and one in the fourth for a 4-3 margin.

Nick Amelon’s RBI single and a RBI ground ball by Waldschmidt put South up 5-4 in their half of the fourth, a lead they wouldn’t give up. South added two more insurance runs in the fifth as Corey Clarke and Kyle Cole drove home runs with singles.

Brent Yotty was the winning pitcher, striking out eight and giving up just five hits.

T-C South opened the District 4 tournament Friday with a 6-4 win over North East. It took some solid defense, especially at the end of the game, to seal the win.

South scored three times in the first inning for a quick lead, but North East had the bases loaded and one out in the top of the seventh, trailing only 6-4. At that point, a ground ball to Yotty ended up in a double play, one of three for the game for T-C South, to clinch the win.

Yotty finished the game two for four at the plate and scoring twice. He put that together with a 12-strikeout, four-hit pitching outing. Nik Petersen also led the South team in Friday’s win going two for four at the plate and also scoring twice.

Saturday, South won a wild one 16-10 over the Iowa City Nationals team. Corey Clarke got the hit parade started for South driving home a run in the bottom of the first for a quick lead.

South added five runs in the second as Danny Slaubaugh ripped a two-run double and Kyle Ihrig and Waldschmidt each drove home runs as well. The lead got out to 9-1 with three more runs in the third as Waldschmidt drove in another run, Petersen got a run in on a ground out and Amelon singled home a run.

The Nationals’ biggest rally was in the fourth as they scored six runs to trim the lead to 9-7. However, Yotty threw a runner out at home and Amelon flagged down a hard-hit ground ball to end the threat.

South scored three more in the fourth as Cole singled in a run and Tyler Coblentz’ ground ball wound up scoring two runs due to an error. Amelon, Yotty, Mark Skaden and Chris Driscol each drove in runs in a four-run fifth and the Nationals close the game out with three tallies in the sixth.

Ihrig was the winning pitcher for South.

Tri-County South will open state tournament play Saturday at 5:30 p.m. at Woodlin Park in Newton. They will play the host Newton team in the opening round. A win would put them into the early game Sunday evening, while a loss would put them into the late evening contest.

“This is great for our league,” tournament director and T-C South Babe Ruth president Todd Fitzsenry said. “These kids will never forget the experience they will have at state.”

The state champion will move on to the Midwest regional tournament in Colorado. Complete state tournament brackets and directions to Woodlin Park are listed on this page.

T-C South 14-year-old team falls twice

Tri-County South’s 14-year-old team put in two solid outings but fell short in each case at Washington this past weekend.

They fell to Washington 13-3 Friday night in their tourney opener and came back for a hard-fought 10-6 loss to Tri-County North West on Saturday.

The Tri-County South 15-year-old team, consisting of 13-15-year-old players, will open their District 4 tournament Friday night at Mercer Park in Iowa City against the Iowa City Nationals. Game time is 5:30 p.m.