Two of the top 10 Class 3 baseball teams met south of Festus on Monday.
St. Pius X carried the No. 1 ranking in the Missouri High School Baseball Coaches Association into the game against No. 10 Jefferson. The Lancers were supposed to host the Blue Jays on Tuesday but officials moved the game up because of forecast storms.
St. Pius was the home team on Jefferson’s field, but the Lancers left their gloves at home, committing at least six errors, three coming from shortstop Eli Dale, the Jefferson County Activities Association small-schools player of the year in 2018.
Trailing St. Pius X 6-3 going into the sixth inning, Jefferson needed base runners.
Tyler Hedtkamp relieved St. Pius starting pitcher Kaleb Schweigert for the Lancers to start the fifth and allowed an unearned run.
Hedtkamp walked Levi Ebersoldt and Shannon Dowd to start the sixth, but got the next two batters out. Jefferson catcher Levi Roth turned an 0-2 count into a walk to load the bases. Senior Andrew Graves stepped into the batter’s box and cleared the bases with a double to the fence in center field to tie the game 6-6. Graves, Colby Ott and Jacob Bridges all came home for the Blue Jays in the sixth after a series of errors and a wild pitch to make it 9-6, which turned out to be the final score.
With the win, Jefferson (16-3) won the JCAA small-schools for the first time since 2014, the last time St. Pius wasn’t the champion.
For a complete version of this story, read Thursday’s Leader.