Cuba High School’s baseball team began their season on March 21 with a double header against Waynesville and Salem at Salem High School. The Wildcats lost a close game to Waynesville, before mercy ruling Salem in five innings to go to 1-1 to start the season.

C uba was hosting Richland on March 23 and Potosi on March 24, which will both be detailed in next week’s edition. The Wildcats will play on three straight days from March 31 to April 2 against Kingston, at Rolla and against St. James.

Unearned runs prove costly

Cuba’s season debut began in storybook fashion for the Wildcats. Senior Wyatt McMillian walloped a two-run home run in the first at bat of his final season to bring the traveling Cuba crowd to its feet and give the Wildcats an early 2-0 lead. Unfortunately for the Wildcats, those would be the only runs they would score during the game. Waynesville added one run in each of the first, fourth and sixth innings and two in the fifth inning to tally five runs. Each team had five hits on the day, but Cuba’s two errors turned out to be detrimental. Two of Waynesville’s five runs were unearned, spoiling solid pitching performances from senior Cameron Carnal and junior Logan McDonald.

McMillian added a double to finish with two hits, two runs batted in and a run scored. Junior Braden Gipson added a pair of singles and scored on McMillian’s blast. Freshman Layten Eikermann recorded his first varsity base hit on a single in his debut as the team’s starting center fielder. Senior Dylan Pelkey settled in after giving up the early home run and pitched a complete game to pick up the victory for Waynesville.

5-run fourth propels Cuba to win

The Wildcats had minimal time between games and didn’t look fatigued despite continuing to play in the hot sun.

Cuba scored a run in the first inning on an Adam Doyle ground out and added another one in the second on a ground out from McDonald to take a 2-0 lead. After Salem added a run in the third inning to make it a 2-1 game, the Wildcats broke the game open with a five-run inning in the fourth inning. Cuba didn’t record a base hit in the inning and showed continued patience at the plate as Gipson, McMillian, Doyle and Carnal all walked with the bases loaded to score runs.

The Wildcats added four more runs in the fifth inning to expand their lead to 10 runs and walk away with an 11-1 mercy rule victory for their first victory of the season. 

Gipson pitched all five innings for Cuba, striking out nine batters without walking a batter to earn the victory. Cuba’s patient batters walked a whopping 15 times throughout the afternoon. Carnal and Gipson each walked three times and McMillian, Doyle and Chase Hanes each walked twice. McMillian, Eikermann, Aiden Moreland, Reece Biggers and Carter Medows all collected base hits and Biggers and Doyle each drove in two runs for the Wildcats. Doyle, Gipson, Carnal and Eikermann all picked up their first stolen bases of the season. Junior Sylis DuBois led Salem with two base hits.