Reed City baseball coach Eric Grannis (center) and his team hopes for a strong finish to the season. (Herald Review file photo)
REED CITY - Reed City baseball and golf teams are both looking forward to a huge week.
"This was a good week," baseball coach Eric Grannis said. "We started the week off with a tough opponent in Fremont who was undefeated in the conference. We came out with a split against them on Tuesday with a walk-off single in game 1 and a 10-2 loss in game 2.
"Game 2 was a closer game than the score shows. We then traveled to Pine River on Friday where we got a split as well, winning 12-0 in game 1 and losing 4-3 in game 2 on a late-game rally."
Xavier Allen continued his dominating season last week. "He pitched both Tuesday and Friday, while throwing the maximum pitches on Tuesday to be available for Friday," Grannis said. "Tuesday, Xavier threw four innings while allowing four runs and striking out five. Friday was much better for him. He went five innings while allowing no runs and striking out 12. Xavier also hit the ball very well this week collecting six hits with five being extra base hits. Payton Hansen also dominated at the plate, collecting seven hits over the two days."
Hansen is leading the team in average with .458.
Allen is leading the team with a .606 on base percentage
Max Hammond and Hansen are tied for the lead in hits with 33.
Max Hammond leads the team in RBI with 26.
Allen is leading the team in ERA with 0.67 and with 64 strikeouts.
"At this point it depends on what team shows up for each game," Grannis said. "We have played games against good teams where we can't be stopped, then we turn around for game 2 and we look completely opposite from game 1. We feel that we can win every game, we just have to play like it. At this point in the season we are turning our focus towards districts and getting ready to make a big run in the postseason.
"We only have one game this week when we host Grayling on Friday. We are still buttoning some things up around our team. We had some flashes that really showed he we could be as team. It is going to be up to us on how we want the rest of the year to go. We can be very good. We just have to play like from here on out."
Reed City coach Chris Hanson's golf team had two matches last week including at the Tullymore Invitational.
"It was a tough day, we finished 13 out of 16," Hanson said. "It was another cool windy day which seems to be norm for all our matches. Tullymore is a little more of a challenge than our team normally plays so it was a good learning experience and will lead to improvements. We had few higher scores than normal, but a good challenge to put some things into perspective.
"On Tuesday we returned to CSAA league play. It was at Waters Edge Golf Course in Fremont. We got back on track with some better play finishing again team wise in 2nd place. Fischer Morrison was tied for third overall with an 80 and Nick Wirgau tied for sixth with teammate Michael Perri, with his lowest round of the season, both at 87. We are starting to see some improvements in our shot making ability and on course decisions and hope that continues. We look forward to continuing what I believe has been a good season and getting better for the future."
Tuesday, Reed City was at Cedar Chase for the CSAA championship and the Big Rapids invitational at Katke Golf Course on May 28.
