By Paul D. Bowker

LISBON

The sounds of silence eerily arrived suddenly around the Lone Tree dugout Monday afternoon.

Consecutive two-out hits by Montezuma’s Rett Pargeon and Isaac Wedgewood in the sixth inning had given the Braves a 2-1 lead.

The entire season stared Lone Tree’s Lions down.

And then, this happened:

The Lions loaded the bases with none out. They tied the score. Then, they went ahead. And on and on it went. By the time the Lions were done in the seventh inning Monday at Lisbon City Park, they scored seven runs, sent a parade of players around the bases and high-fived each other while shouting in delight.

Lone Tree held on for an 8-5 win and a victory in the opening round of the Iowa 1A District 9 tournament that took three days to complete. Lone Tree trailed 1-0 when the game was suspended Saturday because strong storms blasted through Lisbon.

Sunday, the Lions practiced in Lone Tree.

Monday, they were back in Lisbon. The game finally ended early in the evening when left fielder Jacoby Moffitt made a diving catch for the last out of an inning that produced 10 runs by the two teams, a Montezuma coach ejection and plenty of emotion.

“I had to make it flashy,” Moffitt said, laughing with his coach.

The victory sent the Lions to Sigourney for the second round of the district tournament for the second straight year.

“Our whole goal was to work and get better and better,” head coach Mike Eden said.

Senior pitcher Jack Patterson tossed a 4-hitter until the final inning and completed the game despite yielding three straight hits to start the nail-biting seventh inning. He struck out five and won his third game of the year on a day he found out that he was named to the All-District Team.

Patterson was one of the first four Lone Tree hitters who reached base in the beginning of the winning rally in the seventh inning.

“Going into the inning, we knew we had the top of the (batting) order,” he said.

A walk with the bases loaded allowed the Lions to tie the score at 2-2, then they scored six more runs after two were out. Travis Ford, an incoming freshman, drove in two of the runs with a single to right field.

“It’s nice to see our guys … keep pushing it, playing hard until the end,” Eden said.