Washington County Enterprise-Leader
One Last Hurrah
PRAIRIE GROVE — Towards the conclusion of a disappointing season the 2019 Prairie Grove baseball team played up to its potential for one game — at least.
Garrett Heltemes demonstrated why he was selected as Prairie Grove Male Athlete of the Year for school year 2018-19 by the Enterprise-Leader, scattering 6 hits over 7 innings and striking out 6 Pioneers. Heltemes came through with a clutch performance to get the Tigers by Gentry 6-0 in a play-in game Monday, April 22.
After coach Chris Mileham resigned days before the season-opener Prairie Grove struggled under interim coach Jed Davis going 1-7 in 4A-1 Conference play, which put the Tigers on the lowest rung of league standings.
The win amounted to one last hurrah for Heltemes and classmates: Couper Allen, Drew Cates, and Kaine Caswell, leaving them one postseason victorious memory from their senior season.
The game began as a pitcher’s duel between Heltemes and Gentry starter Aayden Smartt, who fanned 10 Tiger batters.
Heltemes credited Mileham’s influence with empowering him to get into the groove and pitch the Tigers into the District 4A-1 baseball tournament mandated by the Tigers’ ninth place finish in the league. They went into the contest as the lower seed and had to play No. 8 Gentry on the road.
“Coach Mileham always told me to keep the speed up, keep them guessing, don’t give them time to relax, keep the pressure on,” Heltemes said. “That’s what I was trying to do the last couple of innings when I started speeding up my pitches, how fast I was throwing and how many pitches I was throwing to keep the pressure on.”
Heltemes had help from his teammates although they started slowly against Smartt. Prairie Grove caught the Pioneers stealing in Gentry’s first at-bat. Heltemes tripled in the top of the second but was left stranded.
The Pioneers got a man aboard with a bunt single in the bottom of the inning, but that was negated when Allen threw out the runner stealing second. Kyle Fidler stretched out to catch a pop-up in foul territory, dangerously close to the fence to bring the inning to an end.
Prairie Grove took a 1-0 lead in the top of the third. Allen was hit by a pitch and replaced by a courtesy runner. Caswell laid down an RBI bunt mystifying the Pioneers. Gentry could neither get an out at first nor keep a Tiger run from scoring.
Jadin Higgins drew a walk setting up Fidler’s 2 RBI single down the left field line which extended Prairie Grove’s lead to 3-0. Jackson Sorters also walked, but got tagged out coming into third on Heltemes’ single.
Prairie Grove added an insurance run in the top of the fifth. Will Luther singled and moved to third with Sorters batting. Heltemes again went to work with his bat, smashing a sacrifice fly increasing the Tiger lead to 4-0.
Gentry threatened in the bottom of the sixth with runners at first and second, but Heltemes dashed their hopes by inducing Rowdy Smith to hit into a double play. Cates fielded the ball throwing to Sorters at second, who then relayed to Fidler at first for the second out to end the inning.
In the top of the seventh, Caswell singled into right field prompting Gentry into making a pitching change, relieving Smartt who threw 103 pitches in 6 and a third innings. He was charged with the loss after yielding 4 runs.
Against freshman reliever Isiah Lemke, Cates singled into left field and Fidler belted a stand-up double driving in a pair of runs.
Gentry came into its final at-bat trailing 6-0. Heltemes nearly reached his pitch count, yet maintained his poise and struck out the side to record the final out.
“I was one away actually, one away from max,” Heltemes said. “Going into the seventh inning they told me I was around 98 pitches so I knew I kind of had to get the thing over with quickly if I wanted to get the complete game, so I just tried to keep how many pitches I threw each batter down, and do the best I could.”
Heltemes contributed 3 hits while Fidler and Luther banged out 2 hits apiece for Prairie Grove. Fidler had 4 RBIs and Heltemes struck out 6 to earn the win.
“Garrett did great, helped us out a lot,” Luther said. “Our bats were hitting hard, we were doing great, finally had our sweet spot in the season right there.”
Prairie Grove finished 11-13 overall. After the season, former skipper Mitch Cameron returned as head coach.