Last time we were here

CARROLL — Julius Caesar once said ‘Experience is the teacher of all things.’ The New London baseball team hopes that Monday’s Class 1A state baseball quarterfinal may prove that theory correct.

On Monday evening, the Tigers will take the field as one of the most state-tournament experienced teams in the Class 1A field, albeit with just one game up on most of the competition.

New London is one of just three Class 1A teams making back-to-back trips to Merchants Park. The Tigers come back to Carroll after losing a heartbreaker in the 2021 quarterfinals.

New London earned the No. 5 seed in the 2021 tournament and matched up against historical powerhouse Kee, Lansing. A wild game saw the Tigers fall 4-3, thanks in part by a wacky collection of bad breaks.

The Tigers led 1-0 early in that game, but New London thought it should have had a bigger advantage. In the second inning, a bang-bang play at third base went against New London, and the Tigers lost the chance at a bases-loaded nobody out situation, allowing Kee to get out of the inning unscathed.

Then, in the third inning, New London seemingly tied the game up and put the go-ahead run on third base after a Kee throwing error on a bunt by now graduated senior Hecniel Rodriguez, but when the dust settled, the umpires called Rodriguez out on the bunt, saying he had stepped out of the box.

In the bottom of the third, another controversy took place, in which the Tigers had an out taken away on a pickoff to first, which was halted due to a stoppage in play. A balk on Rodriguez was originally called, but then reversed, nullifying the play completely, and Kee would put up one more run.

Still, though, the Tigers were able to rally back to cut an eventually 4-1 Kee lead down to 4-3, thanks in part to key relief pitching by Seth Bailey and a couple of big hits from Josh Catala and Kooper Schulte. Tucker Gibbar also had an RBI triple in that game, and all four of those names will be back in uniform for the Tigers on Monday, as will be the vast majority of the 2021 squad.

It hasn’t been so long for Mid-Prairie, either. The Golden Hawks made state in 2020, the last year it was held at Principal Park in Des Moines.

Mid-Prairie was the No. 4 seed in the 2020 Class 2A tournament, and things didn’t quite go as the Golden Hawks had planned.

After a lengthy wait for the game to start due to another contest going long, Mid-Prairie got off to a rocky beginning. Fifth-seeded West Lyon scored the first 11 runs of that game before the Golden Hawks could respond.

The 2022 Mid-Prairie team looks a lot different from the 2020 squad. Not only has most of the roster changed, but the team is now led by head coach Kyle Mullet.

There are a couple of familiar faces, however, from that Golden Hawks squad. Both current-senior Will Cavanagh and current-sophomore Karson Grout were everyday starters in 2020. Cavanagh had the biggest hit of the game for the Golden Hawks, duking a ball into the outfield for two RBIs.

Although New London’s current players have more experience than Mid-Prairie, it’s the Golden Hawks who will be making their sixth state appearance in total, four more than New London’s two.

The Golden Hawks will have the added advantage of seeing some games get played at Merchants Park before it's their turn to go. New London will be playing in the third game of the weekend, at 4:30 p.m., on Monday. They will be the No. 3 seed against CAM in the Class 1A tournament. Class 2A’s No. 6 seed Mid-Prairie will take on No. 3 seed Cascade at 1:30 p.m., on Tuesday, the sixth of eight quarterfinal matchups to take place in Carroll this weekend.