Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

SOLON – Nine days ago the list of people that saw Solon as a legitimate state tournament team was short.

More accurately, that list was likely almost blank and is easy to understandable why.

Solon lost 10 of its final 13 games to end the regular season and entered postseason play 15-24 and coming off four consecutive losses in which it scored a total of six runs.

Despite the season-long struggles the Spartans never stopped believing in themselves.

On Tuesday that persistence paid off.

Freshman Laeni Hinkle had the game-winning single in the bottom of the seventh inning to lift Solon to a 4-3 win over Center Point-Urbana in the Class 3A, Region 6 title game in Solon.

“It feels awesome, because we’ve definitely struggled this season at times,” Hinkle said. “Coach Brad (Holub) told us every day that he knew the potential that we had and we all believed in each other.”

The win completes an impressive Cinderella postseason run for Solon (18-24) and sends the Spartans to the state tournament for the first time since 2016.

Solon will face top-ranked Benton Community (31-7) in a Class 3A state quarterfinal on Tuesday at 10 a.m. at Rogers Sports Complex in Fort Dodge.

They are very resilient, we overcame a lot of obstacles this year, it was not pretty at times but we peaked at the right time and good things happened,” Holub said. “They believed in one another and just worked. We had patient at bats, played defense came around and we were there at the end.”

Solon trailed for the first four innings on Tuesday as Center Point-Urbana (16-19) took an early lead on a Mya Hillers solo homer in the second.

The Stormin’ Pointers added a run in the fourth when Sophia Simon singled and scored on a throwing error.

Solon took its first lead with three runs in the bottom of the fifth.

Izzy Frees had an RBI double and Emerson Miller an RBI single that tied the score at 2-2 before the Spartans took the lead on a Center Point-Urbana error.

“We had to believe in each other,” Solon freshman Keegan Kleppe said. “Even in the hard times we believed in each other and I think that’s what got us here.”

Solon was out a strike away from ending the game in the seventh but Center Point-Urbana got back-to-back two-out, two-strike hits from Tara Crowley and Grace Estling to tie the game at 3-3.

The game didn’t stay tied long.

“I called timeout after they scored their run and I went out and said, ‘hey ladies, Solon hasn’t been to state in seven years, nobody said it was going to be easy, lets get this out and go in and score our run’,” Holub said. “They listened.”

Kleppe led off the bottom of the seventh with a triple down the left field line.

“Honestly all I heard was Brad telling me to go,” Kleppe said. “I was just trying to go as fast as possible.”

Hinkle followed with the game-winning hit that glanced off the shin of Hillers in the pitchers circle.

“We had a hard start to the season but we all kept believing in each other,” Hinkle said. “The last week we’ve been doing it.”

Senior Kendall Jensen picked up the win for Solon allowing three runs on seven hits while striking out three without walking a batter.

“We knew going into each game of postseason that everyone was doubting us so we just wanted to prove them wrong,” Jensen said. “We had to stay confident, do what we can do and control what we can control.”

Center Point-Urbana                        010  100  1  –  3  7  3

Solon                                                  000  030  1  –  4  6  2

W – Kendall Jensen                            L – Mya Hillers

2B – SOL: Izzy Frees. CPU: Grace Estling

3B – SOL: Keegan Kleppe

HR – CPU: Mya Hillers

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