A rough week on the diamond for the Lisbon baseball team ended Thursday with a trip to the Field of Dreams in Dyersville, where they put an end to a five-game losing streak and beat Springville, 12-0, in three innings.
The day before, the Lions got beat by Iowa City Regina, 12-1, in six innings at City Park Field.
“They hit everything,” junior Bryce Boots said of the Regals. “You put it in the strike zone and they hit it. There’s really nothing you can do about it. They hit the crap out of the ball.”
The Regals (9-1 going into a Saturday game vs. Iowa City West) scored 12 runs on 17 hits. Up 3-0 after four innings, Regina piled it on with nine runs in the fifth and sixth innings.
“Bryce kept them off balance the first two times through the order,” Lisbon coach Lance Kamaus said. “The third time through, they kind of picked up on him.”
On the flip side, the Lions scratched together just four hits, all singles. But they put the ball in play a lot.
“We didn’t get too lucky,” Boots said. “The ball landed every time they put it in play. When we hit the ball, it just went right into their gloves. And sometimes they made some pretty good plays.”
Boots had two of the Lions’ four hits. And after 10 games, the junior is hitting .633 (19 for 30) with three doubles and a team-high 17 RBIs.
It is a heck of a start for a player who hit .217 with 15 RBIs last season.
“The jump from sophomore to junior is a big jump,” Kamaus said. “He’s always had the ability.
“And sometimes when you get really hot, you get good luck. He had one hit the lip of the grass and bounce over the defender.”
Boots said he’s just a smarter hitter than he was last year.
“I know what I want to do with the ball,” Boots said. “I feel god about my approach.”
Most of the Lions want to forget about 2024, when they finished 5-24. After opening this season 4-0, they lost games to West Branch, Mount Vernon, Bellevue Marquette (x2), and Regina.
Marquette got them 13-7 and 12-2 on Monday, June 2, in Bellevue. The Defenders were 11-0 going into Friday’s game vs. Durant.
“These last couple of games are probably the hardest ones we are going to play all year,” Boots said. “At the end of the day, we’ve got to bring stuff together, and go for it.”
The Lions did bounce back with that 12-0 win over the Orioles at the Field of Dreams. The Lions had eight hits by eight different players, including five doubles (Dakota Clark, Boots, Ethan Hoekstra, Luke Robinson, and Jackson Knapp).
They also had another non-conference game at Camanche scheduled for Tuesday, June 3, postponed due to rain.
Lisbon (5-5) just finished one of the toughest weeks of its season, and has equaled its win total from last year.
“It was a tough stretch,” Kamaus said. “We knew it would be.”