Bark River Tops Gladstone To Salvage Tourney Split

GLADSTONE---The Bark River Bucs American Legion Baseball team upset the Gladstone Indians, 9-8, Friday night, at the Gregg Johnson Memorial Tournament in Gladstone. The upset win followed a 12-0 mercy-shortened loss for the Bucs to Marquette. Gladstone had lost to the Eastern U.P. Travelers, 7-6, earlier.

In the Marquette game, Blake Henriksen pitched all five innings for the Blues win.

Matt Richer took the loss for the Bucs, with Ryan Arndt and Kadin Mustafa also throwing.

In the night game, Gladstone took a 2-0 lead in the first inning on an RBI double by Cody Frappier and RBI single by Cooper Cavadeas.

But the Bucs scored four runs in the second inning off Indians starter Tyson Seymour, a Gladstone High School graduate who played last season at Muskegon Community College.

Mustafa smoked a two-run double and Richer followed with a two-run single, both after two were out, and Bark River took a 4-2 lead.

The Indians responded against Arndt, who started the game on the mound and lasted three innings after also throwing against Marquette. Dan Martin clubbed his second home run of the day, another two-run shot to right field, to give the Indians a 5-4 lead.

Bark River came back as the tying run scored on a wild pitch and Sam Hall smoked a two-run single, making it a 7-5 lead.

The Bucs chased Seymour off the mound in the fifth inning as Arndt led off with a double and Mason Korhonen followed with a single.

Ian Schwalbach came in to pitch and Adam Cappaert bunted in the air, over the mound, landing in a perfect spot on the right side of the infield to score Arndt, making it 8-5.

Mustafa followed with an RBI single to make it 9-5, and the Bucs had the bases loaded with no outs before Schwalbach dug deep to get a pop up and two groundouts.

The Indians began to rally against relief pitcher Duner Englund, a Mid Pen High School graduate who played last season at Mott Community College in Flint.

Schwalbach launched a long solo home run to left field in the fifth inning to make it a 9-7 game. Then in the sixth inning, Seymour got a one-out infield single, went to second base on a passed ball, and scored when Martin smacked another RBI base hit.

Cavadeas followed with an infield hit to keep the game going, bringing up Ben Kelly, who had struck out with the tying and winning runs on base against the EUP Travelers earlier in the day.

This time, the ocunt went to 3-2, before Kelly took a called third strike.

The game ended after six innings because the game went past the 2 hour, 15 minute mark, and by tournament rules, no more innnings could begin.

Bark River has two games on Saturday in Escanaba: against the Eastern U.P. Travelers at 10:30 a.m., and against Escanaba at 7:30. The night game will be broadcast on WCHT-AM (NewsTalk 600), and on-line at www.rrnsports.com.

Gladstone closes tournament play Saturday at 4:00 against Marquette.

Click the thumbnails in the ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS box above to see photos, and hear radio replays from the game, and post-game interviews with Mustafa and Englund.