Rippers to take on Mineral Area today in winner-take-all contest

KELSO -- In a rematch of the state title game, the Scott County Rippers and Mineral Area squared off Sunday afternoon for the Cal Ripken 9-and-under Midwest Plains Regional Championship.

Coming in to the contest out of the loser's bracket, Mineral Area needed to beat the Rippers in Sunday's game to force a second game to be played today.

After taking an early four-run lead, Mineral Area held on for a 6-1 win, forcing one final game today at 10 a.m. with the winner taking home the championship.

"(Mineral Area) is going to give us all we want and whoever makes the most mistakes is going to lose and that was us today," Scott County coach Danny Dumey said.

"They had their backs against the wall and they came in pumped up."

Trailing by one run coming in to the bottom of the second, the Rippers saw defensive miscues lead to a much bigger hole.

Scott County started the inning by getting two quick outs before an error by the second baseman on what looked to be the third out breathed new life in to Mineral Area.

From then on, three consecutive batters scored in the inning before a pop-up to the first baseman stopped the bleeding, leaving the Rippers down 4-0.

In what turned out to be their only run of the afternoon, Scott County's Caden Dannemueller hit a drive up the middle, scoring Layne Robinson from third and leaving Dannemueller with a single.

Rounding out the scoring, Mineral Area scored two more runs in fifth frame to make up the final.

The win came after Mineral Area had beaten Sikeston 11-3. earlier in the day to claim the loser's bracket title to advance them to the title game.

Unable to rally, the Rippers went down in order in each of the last three innings.

Mineral Area's win leaves the two squad in reversed roles from where they stood at the Cal Ripken 9-and-under Missouri State Championship.

There, it was Scott County coming out of the loser's bracket and beating Mineral Area, who had advanced out of the winner's bracket, in the first championship game forcing a second contest which Mineral Area won to claim the state title.

Results from today's game will available in Tuesday's edition of the Standard Democrat.