CENTERVILLE — It almost feels like a pennant race is going on between the top two division I baseball programs in the Iowa Community College Athletic Conference.
With two weeks and 10 games left in the regular season, Iowa Western and Indian Hills are deadlocked at top the regional standings. With 11 games separating the Reivers and Warriors from Southwestern, it’s no longer a question of if Iowa Western and IHCC will meet in May in the best-of-three Region XI championship series.
The only question now is where that series will be played at, making each game left for the regional rivals even more important. Indian Hills extended its current winning streak to seven straight games on Saturday, polishing off a three-game series sweep at Iowa Lakes with a 12-5 win in the second game of a doubleheader securing Matthew Torrez’s 200th win as head coach of the Warriors.
“One of the big keys for us during this recent run is that we’ve had guys step up and really start to hit the baseball,” Torrez said. “It kind of makes your line-up a little longer. It gives us an opportunity to score more runs in more spots in the line-up.
“I don’t know if these games are more magnified because of the standings. Maybe one of those games we lost earlier in the season should have been a little more magnified. I just always talk about doing the process and just keep trying to be the same player every day. The rest will take care of itself.”
A.J. Marchetti led the Warriors to a pair of wins at home over Marshalltown, connecting on five hits while driving in seven runs in IHCC’s 6-2 and 15-5 wins over the Tigers last Wednesday at Pat Daugherty Field. Marchett’s first hit was the second RBI double of the opening game for the Warriors in the fourth inning, following a run-scoring hit off the bat of Kevin Ramos with a double to left that put IHCC up 2-0.
“I spent all morning getting some swings in,” Marchetti said. “It really helped. I got to the game and I was feeling good. It felt right.”
Marchetti scored a key run later in the inning on a two-out RBI single by Jeryel Oquendo, who made his first start in nine days. The hit by Oquendo ignited a five-game hitting streak for the freshman infielder that included six hits in the three-game sweep at Iowa Lakes over the weekend.
“We had some guys out and some guys that are starting to show a little wear and tear mentally,” Torrez said. “We got it together and pulled ourselves together. We talk all the time that, when you get your opportunity, go in an do something whether it be making a play in the field or having a quality at-bat.”
Opportunities continued to present themselves for the Warriors against Marshalltown after the Tigers cut IHCC’s opening-game lead to 3-2. Aiden Ennis shut the door out of the bullpen, striking out four batters over the final 1 1/3 innings of game one while Boris Rodriguez added a two-run single with two outs in the sixth to clinch the opening game.
Perhaps no one made more of their opportunity for the Warriors than Wesley Martinez. Called on to pitch for just the seventh time in 37 games, Martinez was nearly perfect in five innings of work retiring 13 consecutive batters shutting down the Tigers after coming in with the Warriors protecting an early 8-4 lead.
“That was really big for us with five games in five days,” Torrez said. “It was really big to save some arms and save some pitching. I didn’t anticipate five innings, but Wesley was really good against DMACC the previous week. He’s done a really good job here lately for us and has given us some really quality innings.”
Indian Hills was able to respond early each time Marshalltown scored, snapping a 4-4 tie in the bottom of the third on a bases-loaded walk drawn by Rodriguez and a bases-clearing double to right by Ramos. Marchetti then delivered the game-clinching blow in the fifth against the Tigers, driving the first pitch from relief hurler Ty Hermsen over the fence in left for a three-run home run that put Indian Hills on top 12-4.
“I told myself to sit back and try to hit something to the right side,” Marchetti said. “He (Hermsen) just happened to throw it right down the middle and I happened to get a hold of it.”
Indian Hills answered back throughout the weekend at Iowa Lakes, erasing an early 4-2 deficit in Friday’s series opener by scoring runs in five consecutive innings on the way to a 12-5 win over the Lakers. The Warriors would put together four-run rallies in three different innings during Saturday’s doubleheader, snapping a 2-2 tie in the third inning of the opening game with four runs in the fourth on the way to a 9-3 win before scoring four times in both the first and sixth innings of a 14-3 victory to close out the series.
“You’ve got to answer scores,” Torrez said. “I think it was a big thing. When they answer, you’ve got to answer back and you’ve got to be able to keep it going in the right direction.”
Indian Hills (23-17, 17-6 ICCAC) returns home for a conference doubleheader with Kirkwood on Wednesday. Game one begins at 1 p.m.
