The Homer baseball team celebrated senior night by defeating Kodiak 12-2 in six innings Friday in Southcentral Conference play.
The Mariners move to 2-5 in the league and 6-7 overall. The seniors honored for Homer were Seth Adkins, Hunter Warren and Austin Dash.
Mose Hayes pitched all six innings for Homer, giving up two unearned runs on only a hit. He struck out 10, walked one and hit two batters.
“He’s throwing great and other guys can get the job done too,” Homer coach Rich Sonnen said. “We just have to make sure the defense can back them up.”
Homer made just two errors, but both of them led to runs.
After going down 1-0 in the third, the Mariners strung together hits and walks to take a 6-1 lead in the bottom of the third. Kodiak cut it to 6-2 in the fifth, but Homer got five in the bottom of the inning. The big blow was a bases-loaded triple by Adkins.
In the sixth, Dash, Warren, Harrison Metz and Austin Ceccarelli strung together singles to score a run and invoke the mercy rule.
Ceccarelli was 3 for 4, while Metz was 2 for 4 with a double, Dash was 2 for 4, and Warren and Karl Wickstrom added hits.
“The guys were a little fired up for senior night, and a little fired up after getting beaten by Soldotna pretty good the other day,” Sonnen said. “They wanted to come back, put on a good show, and pick up a win on senior night.”
Soldotna 7, Palmer 2
The visiting Stars continued rolling by topping the Moose in Southcentral Conference action Friday.
Soldotna moves to 4-4 in the conference and 5-11 overall.
Tanner Ussing pitched all seven innings for the Stars, giving up three hits and two runs while walking five and striking out five.
The game was tied at 1 until the top of the fifth inning, when the Stars scored six runs to open things up.
The top two batters in the order had a big game for the Stars. Jeremy Kupferschmid was 3 for 4 with a run, while David Michael was 3 for 4 with a run and an RBI.
Jacob Boze added a hit for the Stars, while Brennen Werner scored a pair of runs.
Luke Guggenmos took the loss for Palmer, giving up seven runs — three earned — and six hits in 4 2-3 innings. Guggenmos walked seven and struck out seven.
Homer 7, Kenai 5
The visiting Mariners held off the Kardinals on Saturday at the Kenai Little League fields to finish up the regular season at 3-5 in the league and 7-7 overall. Kenai finishes up 1-7 and 1-9.
The Kardinals got off to a slow start, giving up six runs in the first two innings, but then scored three runs in the seventh inning and had the tying run on second base when the final out was made as the team honored Knox Amend, J.T. Lott and Clayton Koroll on senior night.
Austin Ceccarelli pitched the first 6 2-3 innings for Homer, giving up five runs — four earned — on five hits while walking three, hitting three batters and striking out four. Seth Adkins came on to strike out the last batter.
Parker Mattox went the distance for Kenai, with five of the seven runs registering as earned. He gave up six hits and struck out eight.
“He pitched awesome for us,” Kenai coach Luke Oliver said. “The top four batters did the damage. He shut down five through nine all day.”
Sam Berry was 2 for 4 for the Kardinals, while Seth Segura was 1 for 2 and hit by two pitches, Simon Grenier was 1 for 4 and Caleb Smith was 1 for 3.
“We’ve been taking steps in the right direction all year,” Oliver said. “Sometimes when we lost, they’d go into the postgame meeting happier than I was accustomed to, because I don’t like to lose. Today, they were quiet and upset. That’s the way a loss should feel.”
Homer coach Rich Sonnen said his team had some bad breaks, like lining into a double play, that let Kenai hang around. The important thing is Homer was able to close the season with two straight wins.
“This is exactly what we were hoping for,” Sonnen said. “Pick up these last two wins and get some momentum headed into regions.”
Adkins was 3 for 3 with two-run doubles in the first and second innings. Harrison Metz was 3 for 4, while Mose Hayes, Hunter Warren and Johnny Rummery added hits.
Wasilla 6, Soldotna 4
The Stars closed their regular season at 6-11 overall after dropping a nonconference contest on the road Saturday.
Soldotna led 3-0 heading into the bottom of the third, but Wasilla cut it to 3-2 after three, then scored two in the fourth and three in the sixth for a 6-3 lead. The Stars had a run in the top of the seventh.
Chris Jaime pitched the first four innings for SoHi, giving up three runs on four hits while walking two and striking out three. Jeremy Kupferschmid pitched the final two innings, giving up three runs — one earned — on two hits while whiffing three and walking none.
Kupferschmid had two of Soldotna’s four hits at the plate, also scoring two runs. David Michael had the other two runs, while Tanner Ussing and Jacob Boze added hits.
