A fast start to the 2023 American Legion baseball season continued for the Albion Cornerstone Seniors this past week with two dominant victories.
How dominant?
Albion Cornerstone outscored its two opponents 35-1 in seven total innings, with a three-inning no-hit performance included.
Yes, that’s dominant.
Cornerstone began its week with a 16-1 four-inning win over Atkinson at Leon Nelson Memorial Field (Albion Sports Complex). The local Seniors scored six runs in each of the third and fourth innings.
James Fogleman led off the bottom of the first inning with a single, and Carsten Bird and Trent Patzel boosted Cornerstone to a 3-0 lead with RBI base hits. Atkinson scored its lone run in the top of the third before Cornerstone finished with 12 unanswered markers in the next two frames.
Ben Reilly’s two-run double, and RBI singles by Fogleman and Bird drove the six-run burst in the third while Jack Molt and Fogleman cracked consecutive run-scoring triples in a six-run fourth.
Bird was the winning pitcher, allowing a single run on two hits, walking one and striking out two. Albion Cornerstone pounded out 15 hits in the contest, with Patzel going 4-for-4 and Fogleman 3-for-4. Fogleman and Caden Stokes each scored two runs. Fogleman, Patzel, Reilly, Devon Luettel and Jack Molt drove in two runs apiece.
Albion Cornerstone topped that performance Thursday with a 19-0 victory over host Creighton/Plainview that featured a three-inning no-hitter by Trent Patzel.
Patzel shut down the hosts with 39 pitches in the three frames, walking a pair of batters while striking out four. Meanwhile, Cornerstone (8-1) amassed 19 hits in the abbreviated game and also benefitted from four Creighton/Plainview errors. The Albion Seniors tallied five runs in the first, four in the second and 10 in the third and final inning.
Four Albion Seniors – Bird, Patzel, Sam Grape and Reilly – collected three hits, and Fogleman, Stokes, Bird and Grape all scored three runs. Bird, Patzel, Grape and Calvin Webster delivered three RBI apiece.
