Legacy making Mansfield history at state baseball tournament. Carroll goes for 5th title
Mansfield Legacy shouldn’t still be playing.
The Broncos should be watching the state tournament from home.
Trailing 9-1 in the seventh inning of Game 3 against Aledo in the Class 5A Region 1 championship, Legacy scored 12 runs to complete one of the biggest comebacks of all-time.
Legacy won 13-9 to clinch the program’s first trip to the UIL state tournament. It’s the first trip to state for any baseball team from Mansfield. Legacy (32-9) plays a 5A state semifinal game against Friendswood (29-7-1) at 4 p.m. Thursday at Dell Diamond in Round Rock.
“We knew from the get go that we had the talent to go all the way,” Legacy coach Chris McMullen said. “We didn’t talk about it a lot, but we did talk to them about you’re not going to come across a team that’s more talented in the entire schedule.”
Senior Kayden Voelkel went 3 for 4 with two RBI and two runs scored. His two-run single to left field tied the game at 9.
Voelkel also went 2 for 3 with an RBI and three runs during Legacy’s 8-5 win in Game 1.
“We were competing the whole game. Same approach as the rest of them, things just weren’t falling,” said Voelkel about the final inning against Aledo. “We came into that last inning and no one wanted to be the last out. We just kept on fighting. We just kept getting base runners on. It just kept falling into place.”
The Broncos have also beaten Fort Worth Trimble Tech, Justin Northwest, Birdville and Lubbock-Cooper during their playoff run.
They have gone to three games each of the past four rounds.
Legacy has averaged over six runs in 14 playoff games.
“It been pretty wild. We expected it for ourselves, but the way it’s gone, it’s pretty crazy,” said junior Parker Ibrahimi, who had two home runs in the Aledo series.
Ibrahimi started the seventh-inning rally with a solo home run to pull Legacy within 9-2.
He came up again as 17 players batted in the seventh. Ibrahimi drew a bases-loaded walk to make it 9-7.
“I felt it when Parker led off the inning with a home run,” Voelkel said. “We’re going down fighting. I didn’t think we were going to come back to win it, but after Parker hit it, I knew we’d make it a close game.”
Added senior Drake Dowd, “I was sitting next to one of my teammates and we load the bases. We walk in a run and we just look at each other and think ‘what’s going on right now.’ Then a base hit scores two and a walk brings in another and we keep hitting and hitting and we’re just freaking out. We started to smell something. Started to smell a little comeback.”
Dowd is 6-0 on the season with 49 strikeouts in 31 innings.
Voelkel is 4-1 with 43 strikeouts while junior Blake Julius is 6-1 with 49 strikeouts.
Voelkel is leading the team with five home runs and 45 RBI. Ibrahimi has 30 RBI and junior Dylan Schlaegel has 20 RBI and a team-high 34 stolen bases.
“It’s been a blast. We’ve trained all year for this. It’s been an amazing ride especially with this group of guys,” Schlaegel said. “That Aledo game was remarkable. It kind of stands for what we’ve done all season. We’ve had big wins when times were the toughest. It was just a big exclamation point for the season we’ve had.”
Going for 5
With two wins this week, Southlake Carroll will capture its third state baseball championship in the past four full seasons and fifth overall.
Carroll (32-8) opens the state tournament with the 6A semifinals on Friday against Fort Bend Ridge Point (35-5) at 4 p.m. Friday at Dell Diamond.
Tuesday marked the 20th anniversary of Carroll’s Class 4A championship after it beat Calallen 11-4 in the title game. Saturday marks the 40th anniversary since the program’s first state championship when the Dragons beat West Sabine, 7-3, in the 2A final.
Carroll also won state in 2018 and 2019.
The Dragons are making their 10th trip to the state tournament and fourth in the past five full seasons.
Behind Carroll’s success this season is its pitching featuring starters Griffin Herring (LSU commit) and Owen Proksch (Duke).
Herring, a senior, hasn’t allowed a run in the playoffs. He hasn’t allowed a run since April 14 against Eaton. He hasn’t allowed an earned run since March 25 against Keller.
Herring is 12-1 this season with 132 strikeouts in 80 innings. He sports a 0.18 ERA with just two earned runs allowed. He’s 5-0 with 10 hits allowed and 58 strikeouts in five playoff games.
Herring allowed two hits and struck out nine as Carroll beat Keller 4-0 in Game 2 of the 6A Region 1 final. Proksch, a senior, allowed four hits and struck out 10 as Carroll won 2-0 in Game 1.
Proksch is 8-1 this season with a 0.71 ERA and 99 strikeouts in 59 innings. Proksch is 3-0 with one run and 31 strikeouts in the playoffs. He also leads off and plays center field.
Eagle nation
Argyle (35-3-1) and Brock (35-3) are also at the state tournament.
Argyle beat China Spring 2-1 in a 4A state semifinal game on Wednesday. It advances to the 4A state championship at 6:30 p.m. Thursday from Disch Falk Field in Austin.
This is Argyle’s fifth trip to state since 2014.
Argyle won state titles in 2015, 2018 and 2019.
Evan Brandt improved to 15-0 on the season after allowing one run on five hits with five strikeouts in seven innings. China Spring took a 1-0 lead in the top of the second inning on a solo home run.
Argyle took a 2-1 lead in the bottom of the third. Ean Sellars led off the inning with a triple to center and scored on a wild pitch. Alex D’Angelo drove in Brayden Rosckes on an RBI sacrifice fly.
Brock will play Diboll (38-4) in a 3A state semifinal game at noon on Friday.
Brock is making the trip for the third time in the past four full seasons and seventh overall, but the program will be looking for its first state championship since 2006.
The Dallas-Fort Worth area has eight teams at the state tournament this year (Carroll, Rockwall-Heath, Legacy, Frisco Wakeland, Argyle, Celina, Brock, Gunter).
This story was originally published June 9, 2022 at 5:00 AM.