By Matt Brown and Dave Erickson
The Maple Lake Lakers punched their ticket as the fourth seed in the 2024 Minnesota State Tournament, with Buffalo, Loretto, and Litchfield joining them. The Lakers drafted Aiden Smith, Riley Gruenhagen, and Carter Scanlon to bolster their pitching ranks. The single-elimination tournament will be hosted by Belle Plaine, Jordan, and Green Isle, features 48 teams from across the state, and runs August 16th through September 2nd.
Maple Lake 3, Delano 1
Everything was on the line Thursday night (Aug. 8) as perennial powerhouses Delano and Maple Lake squared off with the winner guaranteed a spot at state and the loser done for the year.
Like the Friday before, Lakers southpaw ace Hunter Malachek was involved in a pitcher’s duel. This time he locked horns with Delano ace Max Otto.
The A’s got on the board first by taking advantage of a couple Lakers errors in the third inning. With one out, Marcus Riewer reached base when first baseman Logan Orazem bobbled his ground ball. After stealing second, he came home when Jack Paulson’s single to left got by Donnie Mavencamp for an unearned run and a 1-0 lead.
The tall righthander retired the first 19 Laker batters he faced before a full count walk to Malachek with one out in the seventh. But seemingly getting stronger as the game went along, that didn’t faze him in the least as he struck out four of the next five to take a no-hitter into the ninth. He was always ahead in the count and induced soft contact all game long, striking out 10 to that point.
It seemed to take forever to solve Otto, but better late than never. With plenty of Lakers fans going to rally cap mode, Logan Orazem lined a double down the leftfield line leading off the ninth. Luke Fobbe then laid down a perfect bunt to get Orazem to third. But when the catcher’s throw to first got by the second baseman, Logan came home to deadlock the game at 1-1. After Riley Decker struck out, Hunter Malachek stepped up in a big way, prolifically helping his own cause by hammering an Otto fastball over the rightfield fence for a game-changing home run, putting the Lakers up 3-1.
On the mound, Hunter kept Maple Lake in the game by matching Otto inning by inning. His clutch pitching quashed two potential Delano rallies late in the contest. With the bases loaded and two outs in the seventh, a fly ball to center got him out of the jam, and in the eighth, he reached back for some extra and struck out two after the A’s got runners on second and third with just one gone. He did give up his second walk to start the bottom of the ninth, but settled down and got the next two hitters swinging at strike three before Orazem made a tumbling catch of a foul pop up near the Lakers dugout to end it, thus avoiding having to face Delano slugger Toby Hansen. Malachek struck out 12, scattering five hits and walking two and hitting two while going the distance. Otto gave up just the two hits and one walk while striking out 12 as well.