Hicks hurls Bell City baseball team into Class 1 final four

BELL CITY, Mo. ­-- Bell City starter Austin Hicks delivered his pitch to the plate in the top of the sixth inning, and after seeing the called third strike to strand the bases loaded, he turned toward his team's dugout and pumped his right fist in the air.

The sophomore struck out the final two batters to escape the jam with his team maintaining a one-run lead in the Class 1 quarterfinal at Bell City High School.

Pitching in that decisive moment, and in his team's 2-0 win over the Falcons to advance to the final four, is something on which he thrives.

"Yes, ma'am, I love them," Hicks said of pitching in pressure situations.

It was the most tense moment of the game for the Cubs' defense. Hicks gave up a leadoff single and a one-out single to left -- his second and third hits of the game -- before shortstop Cole Nichols misfielded a ball to load the bases.

Dora second baseman and three-hole hitter Derrick Dixon worked a full count before striking out, and Hicks followed with a strikeout of cleanup hitter Tanner Hoover to keep the lead intact.

"I knew I had to keep throwing strikes and don't put the pressure on myself but put the pressure on them and make them come through," Hicks said. "... I just told my shortstop, 'I'm going to pick you up right here, man, and we're going to get through this.'"

Hicks told his team something similar before the game even started. Coach Justin Simpher said that during the sixth inning the first thing his mind wandered to was Hicks telling the Cubs, "I'm going to throw you on my back, guys, and we're going to go play ball."

Dora only had one other base runner reach third in the game. After Hicks allowed his first hit of the game to Treysen Hambleton to start the fourth, a groundout moved him to second. Hicks struck out the next batter before Hambleton reached third on a pitch in the dirt. Another strikeout stranded him.

Junior third baseman Nate Finney noticed a different demeanor from his pitcher coming into the contest.

"Just his look. He just had a fire that he never had before," Finney said. "He just knew he was going to win the game."

Hicks was also 2 for 2 at the plate and drove in the game's winning run.

Nichols singled under a diving third baseman to lead off the bottom of the third and stole second before Hicks singled to right center to score him and put the Cubs up 1-0.

Hicks said he didn't settle into the game once he had a lead because he knew Dora's deficit was that much more of an incentive for them offensively.

"It made me feel like I needed to sharpen my game a little more because I knew that they were going to have to come back and battle to get a run," Hicks said. "I felt like I had to improve my stuff to keep staying ahead."

Hicks recorded 10 strikeouts and hit one batter with a pitch while giving up four hits in the complete-game shutout.

Dora starter Braitton Earls took the loss, allowing one earned run in four innings of work. He gave up five hits but kept the Cubs' hitters off-balance before exiting after giving up a lead-off single in the fifth.

He was replaced by Hambleton, who gave up a one-out hit before facing the top of Bell City's lineup. Nichols hit one to second for a 4-6 fielder's choice when he beat the double-play throw to first. Simpher sent Brandon Abner home on the play, and Abner was thrown out at the plate to come up empty-handed in the inning.

"The guy they threw was good. He wasn't a guy that was going to throw the ball past you," Simpher said. "... We hit some balls, we just never did really string hits together with runners on. Then I send a kid on a play to put some pressure on them, and they handled it well. I thought both kids came in and threw well for them and doing what they had to do. We just happened to find a way, even going back to the fundamentals in the later innings."

Hicks led off the bottom of the sixth with a walk before Finney laid down a bunt single for the first time this season. The runners advanced to second and third on a sacrifice bunt by center fielder Peyton Maddox, and Hicks scored on a 6-4 fielder's choice for the final score.

"It's awesome," Simpher said. "I think it's the first time the school's ever gotten there, and I was trying to not let the excitement get the most of me throughout, thinking about it. But now that it happened, I don't know, it's just awesome. Words can't even explain what it feels like. It's just an unbelievable feeling."

The Cubs (23-3) will face Northwest (Hughesville) in a state semifinal game at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at T.R. Hughes Ballpark in O'Fallon, Missouri. Hurley and Atlanta will square off in a semifinal at 7 p.m. Tuesday.

"I said, 'Now you can talk about it,'" Simpher said of his postgame message. "The whole time the lips have been sealed from the talk about getting to go to state and everything, so I said, 'Now you can talk about it, but now we've got to go to work about preparing for the next.'"

Dora 000 000 0 -- 0 4 1

Bell City 001 004 x -- 2 7 0

WP -- Austin Hicks. LP -- Braitton Earls. Multiple hits -- Bell City: Hicks 2-2, Brandon Abner 2-3; Dora: Treysen Hambleton 2-3.