Cape Central baseball stuns top seed Poplar Bluff in C5D1 semifinal

SIKESTON, Mo. — Everything seemed to fall into place for Cape Girardeau Central baseball.

A sophomore pitcher beat one of the more experienced lineups in the area, the defense behind him held up its end and the offense scored runs when it needed to.

The recipe for an upset had all its ingredients, with Jacquen Cummins and Copper Crosnoe doing the stirring.

Crosnoe pitched a complete game win and Cummins was a vacuum at third base, coming up with one play that shifted the tide, helping Central spring a surprise 3-1 upset over state-ranked and top-seeded Poplar Bluff Monday during the semifinals of the MSHSAA Class 5 District 1 tournament in Sikeston.

The Tigers not only busted a bracket primed for a Poplar Bluff run, but they also broke a string of seven straight losses to the Mules dating back to the 2011-12 season. Poplar Bluff already owned a 5-2 win over the Tigers on April 16 of this season as well as a nine-inning, 1-0 win during last season’s district semifinal.

“I’m almost speechless,” Cummins said. “We lost to them two times in a row, districts last year and this year in the regular season. We came out and got a big win.”

Central (15-12) is scheduled to take on No. 3 Jackson (20-12) today at 5:30 p.m., weather permitting, for the district championship. Jackson, the defending champions, pulled off an upset of its own with an 8-5, nine-inning win over No. 2 Sikeston.

“It’s a big win. It’s not the district championship by any means but you have to win them to get there,” Cape Girardeau Central coach Tatum Kitchen said. “It’s a great win for us. You look at what (Poplar Bluff) has done over the course of the year and going against the team that has the conference coach, pitcher and player of the year, they’re tough to beat. I’m not going to say we played as good as we can play, but it was close to it.”

Crosnoe came up big for the Tigers during his seven innings of work. He held a Poplar Bluff team that averages six runs a game to one run and three hits. He struck out two and walked four on 93 pitches.

“I couldn’t be more pleased with a little sophomore named Cooper Crosnoe throwing today,” said Kitchen. “You come in to this game and you see all the runs (Poplar Bluff) has scored and all these big offensive numbers and to limit them to one run and a couple hits, is impressive.”

It was by far the sophomore’s biggest outing and biggest game of his young career.

“I was just trying to throw strikes and not walk too many,” Crosnoe said. “We had some good plays on defense and a few double plays.”

He out-dueled Poplar Bluff starter Kameron Misner, who’s committed to playing baseball for the University of Missouri next fall. Misner was the unfortunate recipient of a few atypical miscues from a defense that’s been stout all season until this point. Central scored all three of its runs in the third inning after one of those errors.

Cummins singled in the first run and an error from Trevor Fredwell in left field allowing another run to score to keep the inning alive. Clayton Reynolds added the Tigers’ third run with another single off of Misner, who came in to Monday’s semifinal with a 4-1 record and an ERA of 2.77.

“I thought he threw a good game,” Poplar Bluff coach Steven Edwards said. “Two errors caused three runs in my opinion. That’s baseball. It’s going to happen that way sometimes, ,,, The process is a little tough to take right now, the way we played all year and to come out and make a couple errors that are uncharacteristic of us. We couldn’t get the ball through on the offensive end. It was just a tough, tough loss for us.”

The Mules (25-5-1) had its best chance to overtake Central in the bottom of the fourth but Cummins snatched that opportunity, and possibly the game, away.

Poplar Bluff put its first four batters on to start the inning and scored its lone run after Joe Darlin reached on an error. With the bases loaded and one out in the inning, a screaming line drive off the bat of Austin McIntosh was aimed directly at Cummins, who snagged the hit out of the air for the second out and had the presence of mind to nab the runner at third for a double play.

“I just reacted to it, to be honest,” said Cummins, who was the hero during Cape Central’s district quarterfinal game against Hillsboro on Saturday with a game-winning hit in the seventh. “I had no time to think.”

It was a play that shifted the complexion of what could have been a more lucrative inning for the Mules.

“With the bases loaded and one out you’re thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, just get out of here with one run,’” Kitchen said. “Lucky for us, we had the infield in and we had the right guy at third. I don’t know if another third baseman makes that play.”

Poplar Bluff had just two base runners after Cummins’ play.

Cummins went 2-for-4 to lead the Tiger offense.

Misner took the loss for the Mules, allowing three runs (two earned) on four hits and five walks while striking out six.

Poplar Bluff ends the season with a school-record 25 wins and a SEMO Conference Tournament championship.

Cape Central 003 000 0 -- 3 4 3

Poplar Bluff 000 100 0 -- 1 3 1

WP -- Cooper Crosnoe. LP -- Kameron Misner. 2B -- Misner (PB). Multiple hitters -- Central: Jacquen Cummins 2-2.