Blue Jays fall to Bismarck Century at Jack Brown

Things weren't looking too hot for Brooks Roaldson starting out Thursday night.

The sophomore shortstop for the Jamestown High School baseball team let a grounder from Bismarck Century's Ryan Keup through his legs committing the Jays' first error of the night.

"It got under me, it was just a mistake," Roaldson said. "(Pitcher) Jacoby (Nold) did a good job of getting us out of that inning. I would have taken it back if I could have but I just had to move on and go to the next pitch."

The sophomore worked to make up for the early mistake down the stretch.

"Brooks has been hitting the ball really well," JHS head coach Jack Bowman said. "He went 3-for-3 in our first two games."

Unfortunately, what was one of Roaldson's best performances of the season turned out to be a loss for the Blue Jays.

Roaldson and the Blue Jays dropped Thurdsday's doubleheader hosting Bismarck Century at Jack Brown Stadium, 6-1 and 13-4.

JHS last played two weeks ago, recording a split with Bismarck High to go 1-1 in the WDA standings. Century is now 2-2 in the WDA standings and 3-5 overall. The Jays will see their first road action of the year this weekend when they head up to Minot on Saturday.

"We don't practice like that," Bowman said of the Jays' performance against Century. "We are a lot cleaner (in practice) so it will just be something that we keep working through. It is (only) our third and fourth game. Not an excuse, but we're still working through it."

The Jays' bats were slow to get moving in the first inning with Century pitcher Carson Motschenbacher going 1-2-3 from the mound. Motchschenbacher tossed six innings allowing three hits and striking out two.

Roaldson didn't see the plate to start the first inning, but the Jays' No. 6 batter locked down the team's first hit of the night in the second with a long drive out to right field. In the seventh, Roaldson followed Gage Orr's leadoff single with a double out to left field. Roaldson went 2-3 in the first game.

"I was feeling pretty confident," Roaldson said of his at-bats. "I've been hitting the ball really good. This is my first year playing varsity so I just kind of stepped up and hoped for the best. I got my pitches and I hit 'em."

In game No. 2 Roaldson, was named the Jays' designated hitter. The sophomore went 2-4 at the plate.

"We wanted to keep him in the lineup but we wanted to have some other guys get out and play some defense so that's why we put him there. We wanted to make sure he kept swinging the bat," Bowman said.

Jakob Schempp was big on defense out in center field.

With two outs in the fifth, the junior center fielder took off running when Century's Ryan Keup sent a line drive to the fence -- extending his glove to nab the ball as he was falling backward.

Schempp came up with the ball and tossed it into first baseman Michael Mahoney to come up with a center-fielder-assisted double play to stop Century's bats in the inning. Ty Monson and Gage Orr also made impressive dives in the infield to keep the Patriots off the board in the fourth and fifth innings, but it was too little too late. The Patriots' two-run performance in the seventh finished off the Blue Jays 6-1.

Jamestown couldn't seem to rebound in the second game, committing six errors in 2 1/2 innings. Century nailed down four runs in the first inning alone and turned in a three-inning total of nine runs, seven hits and no errors.

The Jays finished game two with a mid-game push racking up four runs across the fourth and fifth innings to make it a 9-4 game. Two more Blue Jay errors in the sixth gave up easy runs.

"I told the guys that the only number up there that bothers me is the eight errors," Bowman said. "The first game we had two errors right away in the first and we just couldn't recover. We are not going to win very many games with errors."

The Blue Jays will be working on getting errors cleaned up before heading over to the Magicians' home venue.

"Minot is playing really well right now," Bowman said. "We'll see how this weekend goes and make the best of it."

Bismarck Century 6, Jamestown 1

BHS 003 001 2 -- 6 10 2

JHS 000 000 1 -- 1 5 3

JHS: Jacoby Nold, Mason Lunzman (5); BC: Motschenbacher. W -- Motschenbacher, L -- Nold

Highlights: JHS -- Brooks Roaldson 2-3, 2B, Jakob Schempp 1-3, Gage Orr 1-3, 2B, Michael Mahoney 1-3.

BC, Ryan Keup 2-4, 2B, RBI, Joe LaDuke 2-4, Carter Krueger 1-3.

Records: Bismarck Century 2-5; 1-2 WDA, Jamestown 1-2; 1-2.

Bismarck Century 13, Jamestown 4

BC 423 013 0 -- 13 11 3

JHS 000 310 0 -- 4 8 8

JHS: Carson Orr, Jackson Walters (4), Max Fronk (6); BC: Seth Dietz (4) Luke Pengilly. W -- Dietz, L -- Orr.

Highlights: JHS -- Nold 3-4 3B, Roaldson 2-4, Kasen Rowell 1-2, Connor Hoyt 1-4. BC -- Seth Dietz 1-3, 2B, Noah Riedinger 2-5, 2 RBI, Joe LaDuke 2-5, RBI, Ryan Keup 3-4, 4 RBI