Baseball: Wausau West splits games at Tomah Triangular. Thurs outstanding in win over Tomah.

True Thurs allowed just 1 hit and 1 unearned run over 6 innings to help Wausau West beat Tomah 6-1 in the first game of the Tomah Triangular on Saturday. The Warriors fell to D-1 5th ranked Chippewa Falls 14-3 in 6 innings in their second game. Both games were broadcast live on the Wausau Area Sports YouTube channel.

In the opener vs. Tomah, Thurs gave up a single to the 2nd player he faced, Teag Stephenson, and then didn't give up another hit in his 6 innings on the mound. Thurs did have a pair of jams to deal with in the first two innings. Tomah loaded the bases with none out in the bottom of the first but Thurs retired the next three batters to get out of the inning unscored. In the bottom of the 2nd, Tomah loaded the bases on two walks and an error with one out in the inning. After a pop up for the 2nd out, a wild pitch put the Timberwolves up 1-0.

The Warriors would respond in the top of the 3rd inning and take the lead for good. Keegan Kruzan led off with a single. Joe Graveen then walked with one out and Kam Blasky singled home Kruzan to tie the game at 1. Ty Teske hit a sacrifice fly that scored Graveen and give the Warriors a 2-1 lead. West would add another run in the inning on an error to lead 3-1. West would add two more runs in the 5th when Blasky led off with his second hit of the game and scored on a Teske single. West would stretch the lead to 5-1 on a wild pitch that scored Marshal Helke. The final run came in the 6th when Marcus Koenigs led off with a single, advanced to third on a pickoff throw that got away and scored on wild pitch.

That was more than enough for Thurs, who retired 9 straight batters at one point and earned his first pitching win of the season. Kam Blasky was 2 of 3 hitting with 2 runs scored and an RBI while Ty Teske drove in two runs as well.

In the second game against Chippewa Falls, the Warriors started fast. West started the bottom of the first inning with a double off the fence by Joe Graveen. Will Stengl then singled to put runners on the corners with no out. After a pop up, Marcus Koenigs grounded out to 2nd to score Graveen and put the Warriors up 1-0. Marshal Helke followed with an RBI double to score Stengl and make it 2-0. West would make it 3-0 in the 2nd as Parker Monday started the inning with a walk and advanced to second on a single by Alex Kapitz. A wild pitch moved each runner up 90 feet and Graveen drilled a long fly ball to the warning track in right field to score Monday and put West up by 3.

However, it was all Chippewa Falls after that. The Cardinals scored 4 times in the top of the 3rd to take the lead and then put the game away with 7 runs in the 4th as they sent 12 batters to the plate. Chippewa Falls improved to 16-3 with the win. The Warriors are now 6-14 and will meet Wausau East in Wisconsin Valley Conference play on Tuesday and Thursday of next week. Both of those games will be broadcast live on the Wausau Area Sports YouTube channel with the pregame at 4:45 pm and 1st pitch at 5 pm both days.