By MATT PIKE
In just their second road tilt of the season, the St. Joseph Mustangs dropped their first MINK League matchup, fighting back but falling to the Clarinda A’s 4-3 in Clarinda, Iowa.
The A’s took the lead in the third inning on a sacrifice fly by Kane Wilson, scoring Micha Nicholson. In the fourth inning the Mustangs tied up the game behind Benton alum Chris Coy’s RBI single, scoring Lafayette alum Brayden Luikart, tying the game up at 1-1.
Clarinda took the lead back in the sixth inning on another sacrifice fly, this time by Tayvon Homolar driving in Cooper Knight. Again though, in the very next inning, St. Joseph rallied to tie the game up with an RBI single by Trevor McCollum, bringing home Tyler Gundelfinger. In the bottom half of the seventh, the A’s scored two runs on RBI singles, the first by Drake Cobb scoring Nicholson, and another by Knight driving in Brady Dobson.
Trailing 4-2, the Mustangs scored a run in the ninth inning, Jack Mosh driving in Luikart on a groundout, advancing Darius Freeman as the tying run to third base. Freeman though wound up stranded at third base as Coy popped out to first base to end the game.
East Buchanan alum Gage Busby took the loss in relief pitching two innings and giving up three runs on four hits, striking out four. At the plate, Coy was 2-for-5 with an RBI. Luikart was 2-for-4 with a walk and two runs scored, while Dom Felix was also 2-for-4.
The Mustangs are now 11-2, 7-1 in the MINK League. They stay on the road next and travel to face the Nevada Griffons.
You can follow Matt on X @KfeqMatt.
