Branched Oak battles selves in trio of games

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After winning three of its first four games to open the season, the Branched Oak baseball team was feeing pretty good. Difficulties getting off the field last week stole some of that joy.

The Bucks, a co-op of students from Malcolm and Raymond Central high schools, committed 18 errors in three games while allowing 21 unearned runs.

“It’s definitely a concern,” Bucks’ head coach Andrew Edwards said. “We have to get it fixed.”

Branched Oak opened the week with a 15-4 home loss to Ralston on March 29. The Bucks jumped out to a 2-0 lead when Travis Nelson, Rylan Stover and Hayden Frank recorded hits in the first inning. A third-inning double by Nelson followed by an RBI single from Stover made it 3-0 in the third inning.

Things unraveled in the top of the fourth when Ralston scored seven runs on four hits and three Branched Oak errors. It was more of the same in the top of the sixth when Ralston scored eight more runs on five hits and three errors.

“It’s pretty deflating when you can’t get out of your own way,” Edwards said.

Nelson led the Bucks at the plate by going 3-for-3 with a double.

There was little improvement the next afternoon when the Bucks made the short trip to Waverly and lost 13-4. A four-run third inning and an eight-run fifth made for a long day for the Branched Oak pitching staff.

Frank went 3-for-4 with an RBI while Nelson was 2-for-4 from the leadoff spot.

“Obviously, Waverly and Ralston are much bigger schools than ours are,” Edwards said. “When the season began, my goal was for us to beat the schools and co-ops that are our size or smaller and be competitive against the bigger Class B schools.

“So far, we haven’t been very competitive against those big schools.”

Branched Oak returned home April 2 with a chance to pick on someone its own size when a winless Twin River team came to Malcolm. The Bucks picked up an ugly 18-11 win over the Titans.

With a 12-3 lead in the bottom of the fifth, Branched Oak had a chance to end the game by mercy rule as the game-ending run was on third base. A ground out ended the inning and extended the game.

The Titans bats came alive in the top of the sixth as they scored six runs on five hits and took advantage of a two-out error to shrink the deficit to three.

The Bucks answered with six runs of their own in the bottom of the sixth, including a solo home run from Mitch Albrecht and three-run blast that was part of a 3-for-4, five-RBI day for Connor Zegar.

Colby Denhartog went for 4-for-4 with two doubles, while driving in three runs.

“Connor and Colby have been kind of up-and-down so far this year,” Edwards said. “It was great to see those guys come alive at the plate.

“Hopefully, this was a confidence boost on which they can build on.”

Branched Oak (4-3) has another full week as it welcomes Auburn (0-4) to Malcolm on Monday before hosting Platte Valley (4-4) in Valparaiso on Thursday, April 8. Douglas County West (0-6) comes to Valparaiso on Friday, April 9.

“These are schools that are closer to our size and the kind of teams we should be able to handle,” Edwards said. “Our plate discipline needs to be good and we need to clean up the mistakes on defense.”