The Brenham Cubs have had to find practice homes away from Fireman’s Park this week to prepare for their bi-district series with Kingwood Park.
Compared to the alternative of not making the playoffs in each of the last two years, the Cubs are gladly practicing wherever they can.
“It is a good chance of scenery and it gets guys excited,” said Brenham coach Chase Wheaton. “Anytime we are doing that, it is playoff time.”
Brenham faces a tough first round battle with Kingwood Park in a rare opening round matchup of district champions after the Cubs earned their share of the District 17-5A crown last week.
The Cubs closed the district season with a sweep over Rudder for their second series sweep of the year. Wins of 11-5 and 13-1 over the Rangers allowed Brenham to be in position when College Station swept Lake Creek to set up a four-way tie for the district title.
The Rudder series put a cap on a five-game win streak for Brenham. The Cubs scored nearly 10 runs per game with no less than eight runs in each game. The stretch also included the second game of its district series with Montgomery and non-district games against Iowa Colony and 6A playoff team Cypress Woods.
Junior Drake Bentke, who tallied seven hits and collected a team-leading nine RBI during that stretch, said the win streak saw the Cubs play great team baseball.
“Guys are seeing it well. Guys are putting together good at bats,” he said. “We are playing together as a team, not individually. Hopefully, it carries over to the playoffs.”
Yet, Brenham is entering the playoffs on a sour note after losing a playoff seeding game to Montgomery 5-2 on Saturday. The Cubs tallied just two hits against the Bears at Tomball Memorial High School and struck out 10 times, more than the entire series against Rudder.
Wheaton said Saturday’s game gave his team a tough offensive test. Montgomery’s Wyatt Clement, who had not thrown in a game all season, gave the Bears five quality innings on the mound to lead his team to victory.
“The first thing I told them is, ‘I was disappointed in the way we competed today,’ but you take it with a grain of salt and you understand those games at this time in the year and get back into the fight,” he said.
Saturday’s loss is not dropping the confidence of the Cubs, though. If anything, they believed Saturday’s game prepared them for the playoffs.
“It was good to go out, face competition and just get that visual of what we will be seeing in playoffs,” said junior shortstop Dalton Hart.
Brenham has four players with at least 10 plate appearances batting over .280 over its last 15 games with Hart and Bentke leading the way. The junior duo leads the team with averages of .396 and .381, respectively, during that stretch while also being the top two hitters in hits, doubles and RBI.
Both batters will be relied on to produce in the playoffs with Hart being counted on to spark the Cub lineup.
“It seems like every time he gets on, not only do we score that inning, but it ends up we score 5,6,7,8-plus,” Wheaton said. “Big game out of him, those guys behind him kind of follow and then a big part of that is the bottom of the order turning the lineup over and getting them to the top.”
Hart also is one of the few people in the Brenham clubhouse with playoff experience thanks to his two seasons at Sherman. His Bearcats qualified for the bi-district round, but were knocked out in two-game sweeps each year.
He said the Cubs are not making the playoff environment as bigger than any other game of baseball, keeping their focus on playing fundamental baseball.
“We just have to go out and play the way that we have been playing, just hitting and I think we will be okay,” Hart said. “We just have to keep that mindset.”
The junior shortstop is also incredibly familiar with the series-opening venue of Leroy Dreyer Field at Blinn College. He said the field plays similar to Brenham’s home at Fireman’s Park in how the ball flies off of bats and in the distance.
Kingwood Park enters the playoffs with its best record since 2021 after winning seven of its eight district games in April. The Panthers averaged 8.4 runs per game during the month with two shutout wins over Dayton in addition to sweeps over West Fork and Splendora.
Brenham is expecting a small-ball approach throughout the Panther lineup. Wheaton said Kingwood Park will show a bunt at any time and even more so in two-strike counts.
“If they are getting the defense moving and guys do not move where they are supposed to, then they will just put it down, but more than anything, I think, is to disrupt the pitchers,” Wheaton said. “They are a scrappy bunch at the plate.”
Brenham’s pitching staff, including Dawson Keim, continues to be confident heading into the playoffs. However, Keim said Kingwood Park’s scrappy ability makes throwing strikes without throwing mistake pitches even more crucial.
“I think you just have to be a lot more locked in on the zone, be able to throw it where you need to because if you leave a pitch down the middle there, they are going to make you pay for it,” he said.
Brenham is expecting to face pitchers with velocities in the low to mid-80s with solid control. The Cubs are prepared for good control thanks to Saturday’s game against Montgomery with Hart saying Brenham will need to get used to having to put the ball in play to make opposing defenses work for outs.
The Burton Panthers (14-10), meanwhile, are searching for their eighth consecutive bi-district championship this week against Dallardsville Big Sandy, beginning with a Thursday doubleheader in Huntsville.
The 2025 district season gave the Panthers a fair share of comfortable victories and challenging games. Burton finished third in District 26-2A after splitting series with Milano and Iola while sweeping Snook and Somerville.
Burton’s split over Milano came after a 14-1 win on April 17, which gave the Panthers third place overall in the district and the district’s top seed in the 2A Division II playoffs.
The win saw Burton’s lineup produce 14 hits with six multi-hit games across the lineup. Both marks are the team’s best in district play.
Tyler Witt, Reuben Rodriguez and Ryder Biggs will all look to maintain their positive play into the playoffs. All three Panthers tallied 12 hits during district play with Biggs leading the group in the RBI column with 10 in district play.
Witt along with Eli Jaeger each pitched 20 innings during district play and will lead the Panthers pitching staff in the playoffs. Both pitchers earned high strikeout-to-walk ratios in district play. Witt earned 5.57 strikeouts per walk in district play with Jaeger coming in at 4.6 strikeouts per walk thanks to 23 total strikeouts and five walks.
Dallardsville Big Sandy (13-9-1) presents a lineup consisting of six players batting over .280 and three players hitting over .300 on the season. Zach McGallion leads the Wildcats with a .404 average and 26 RBI, but has not played since April 7.
Kolten Glover is second on Big Sandy’s batting list with a .397 average along with a team-leading 29 hits to with 15 RBI and 10 walks. However, he will face Burton with a two-game hitting drought from the Wildcats’ final district series.
The Wildcats finished 8-5 in district play, including three games against 1A opponents in their district alignment. Big Sandy swept West Hardin and Sabine Pass while earning a vital split against Deweyville in the last week to ensure their playoff position.
Burton and Big Sandy will meet in the playoffs for the third time and first since the 2018 regional quarterfinals. The Panthers lost both previous series against Big Sandy in two games.
Teams like Thorndale, last year’s area round opponent, are no longer in Burton’s potential playoff path because of the division split. However, Flatonia, ranked by the Diamond Pro/THSB rankings at No. 16 in 2A, potentially awaits in the regional semifinals.
Burton looks to go beyond the second round of the playoffs this year for just the third time since 2010, but for the second time in three years after their 2023 regional quarterfinal appearance. The Panthers have lost in the area round in four of their last five playoff runs.
Originally published on brenhambanner.com, part of the BLOX Digital Content Exchange.