ELDON — Whether it was standing at home plate in Eddyville on Monday night or standing behind home plate on Tuesday night just north of Eldon.
Jager White seemed to find himself right in the middle of game-deciding drama in the final two South Central Conference contests of the season for the Centerville baseball team.
One night after striking out with two on and two outs in the top of the seventh of Centerville’s 5-3 loss at Eddyville-Blakesburg-Fremont, White was on the other side of thrilling outcome on Tuesday night at Cardinal. The Centerville junior received a throw from Euan Lechtenberg and tagged out Cayden Courtney, who was trying to score the tying run on a two-out single by Kazin Miller, clinching a 9-8 victory in 10 innings for the Big Reds.
“At first, I thought Euan was going to spike the ball, so I got down preparing to block it,” White said. “When I realized the ball was coming right to me, I flipped my glove to catch it and make the tag on (Courtney’s) foot. If the throw hadn’t been right to me, I don’t know if I could have made that tag. I was just focused on keeping the ball in front of me.
“There are a lot of ups and downs. There were a lot of things that went wrong that could have gone right for us, but I’m glad we could pull it out at the end.”
Centerville (10-21, 9-12 SCC) will have over a week to prepare for the Class 3A substate quarterfinals at Saydel on July 11 after closing out the regular season at Twin Cedars on Wednesday. Cardinal (15-10, 12-9) will return to the diamond in Truro for a Class 2A district semifinal against either Davis County or EBF, who open postseason play against each other this Saturday in Bloomfield.