Northwoods Legion continues perfect season

The Northwoods American Legion baseball team (19u) continued its perfect season as it moved to 7-0 on the summer season with an 11-2 home win over Rhinelander last Monday and a 3-2 win in eight innings against Crandon Friday. 

A road game at Rhinelander was cancelled Friday, so the Eagle River team got a matchup with Crandon to make up for it. 

A hot start for Northwoods against Rhinelander allowed the team to put up nine runs in the first inning. 

“Our offense was hot from the start in the first inning, scoring nine runs,” said Northwoods manager Dustin Hoeft. “Everybody made solid contact off of Rhinelander pitching.” 

Brody Hoeft got the ball to start the game and had plenty of run support behind him to get into a groove on the mound. 

He pitched a strong five innings and didn’t allow a run. Jonah Will came in for relief and threw the rest of the way to shut down the Hodags. 

“Our pitchers have been doing a good job of keeping our opponents off the scoreboard this year,” explained Hoeft. 

Fast forward to Friday, and it was a much tighter contest for Northwoods. Eagle River and Crandon went back and forth for the first seven innings and were deadlocked at 2-2 late in the contest. Will got the start on the bump and pitched five innings before handing the ball off to Ethan Miller in the sixth.

Hoeft said that a bases-loaded situation turned the tide for Northwoods to get into extra innings and eventually win. 

Miller got jammed and Crandon loaded the bases with nobody out, but Hoeft (Brody) came in and got out of it to hold Crandon and keep the game tied. 

Northwoods would go on to win on a walk-off walk after a patient at-bat by Hoeft (Brody) in the bottom of the eighth inning. 

“We faced a good pitcher who had good movement, and we managed to get the bases loaded, and Brody battled at the plate and drew a walk-off walk,” explained Hoeft. 

Northwoods looks to keep its momentum as it closes the regular season this week with a home game against Lakeland on Wednesday, July 16, at 6 p.m. Regionals will then start for the team on Friday, July 25.