Class 3A baseball postseason gets underway

The Class 3A baseball season gets underway tonight with Fairfield, Mt. Pleasant and Washington all in action but at three different sites.

Mt. Pleasant, which tied for the Southeast Conference championship with Burlington, will host Fort Madison, a team it has defeated three out of the four times they have played this year. Mt. Pleasant has a 14-6 record while Fort Madison is 11-6. The winner will advance to play Davenport Assumption at Modern Woodnam Park in Davenport. The Iowa High School Baseball Coaches Association has Assumption ranked first with a 16-3 record.

Fairfield (4-15) will play at Clear Creek-Amana (13-4). Fairfield won the last game between the two teams June 29, 2018, 8-6. CCA is not ranked but did get votes for the Top 10.

Washington (9-7) and Solon (13-7) have met 10 times since 2012 and Solon has won nine of them, but the Demons have a 10-1 win in the last meeting, which was July 9 last year.

Fort Madison's Jason Thurman's .420 batting average was third in the SEC this year, but the Panthers have Chase Williamson's .391 average at sixth, Clayton Lowery at eighth (. 364) and Rylan Seburg tied for ninth with Fairfield's Nate Smithburg (. 352). CCA has three players in the .300s, TJ Bollers at .410 and Grant Jensen batting .532.

Washington has Reece Mayer at fourth in league at .408 and Brady Knutson is 11th at .324. Six Spartans have batting averages over .300, led by Cael O'Neill's .378.

Mt. Pleasant's Nik Coble is second in the league in earned run average at 0.66 and teammate Jaxon Hoyle is third at 1.18. FM's best pitcher is Kane Williams, who has a 1.22 ERA.

Washington's Ethan Patterson (1.84) and Lucas Kroll (2.02) are seventh and eighth respectively. Solon has a freshman in Blake Timmons that hasn't allowed an earned run in 14 innings pitched. Senior Lucas Walker has a 2.49 ERA in 19 2/3 innings pitched and junior Jacob Smith is at 2.71 in 20 2/3 innings.

Elan Ledger leads the Fairfield staff at 3.92. CCA has four pitchers who have thrown at least 22 innings and all have an ERA of less than 1.83.