The freshman baseball team participated in two games on Saturday, April 22, at the Hudsonville tournament. The boys played two tough teams and ended up going 1-1 on the weekend.

The Rangers began their day facing off against the Crusaders from Unity Christian. After losing to the Crusaders during their first game of the season, the Rangers worked hard during practice to prepare to face them again. The boys started at the plate where Oliver Pelon and Naveen Ram were walked, and Keyan Rolfzema, Nick Williams, and Jonathan Van Houten all racked up singles to earn the team two runs. Keyan, Nick, and Jonathan were also able to rack up a second hit along with Will McClain and Ian Paciorek who earned themselves one hit in the game. 

“We did not play our best the first time we played Unity, but our defense definitely improved the second time,” Keyan said. “It felt good to beat them this time since the first loss back at the beginning of the season shouldn’t have happened.”

Will McClain pitched a great game for the Rangers. He was able to strike out nine of the thirty batters he faced and only allowed seven hits. The rest of the game went very well for the Rangers. They were able to hold the Crusaders at zero runs until the sixth inning where they ended up scoring two runs. The game ended with a final score of 8-7, and the boys were able to add another win to their record.

“The team played very well this weekend and everyone played a part in contributing to the win against Unity Christian,” Keyan said. “Honestly, since the team has gotten the rust shaken off, everything has been going smoothly throughout our games. We cut down the amount of errors and all of the team’s bats have heated up.”

The Rangers then went on to play the Hudsonville Eagles in a tough battle. The boys started at the plate again where Keyan, Nick, and Ian were all able to contribute two hits for the team along with Jonathan, Gibson Wierenga, and Caden Harleton, who all had one hit during the game. Caden pitched a fantastic game for the Rangers where he struck out four of the twenty-five batters he faced and only allowed seven hits on the day. The team had phenomenal defense and did not have any errors in the field, but unfortunately fell short to the Eagles 3-1.

“We had a ton of opportunities to win against Hudsonville but it is a team game and we left our runners on base,” Nick said. “Our pitching was awesome this weekend especially Caden Harleton pitching the whole game and only allowing three runs.”

The boys next game will be a doubleheader on Tuesday, April 25, against Greenville on the FHC varsity baseball field.