The Milroy American Legion baseball team was the runner-up in a tournament at Springfield Saturday. Milroy beat . Wabasso 4-3 and Springfield 10-5 before losing to Sleepy Eye in the finals 10-2.

Derek Radke scattered seven hits in the Wabasso victory. Matt Bauer led the Milroy eight hit attack by going 2 for 3 including a home run. Ross Ladehoff was 2 for 3 and had an RBI. Radke helped his own cause with a double.

In the victory over Springfield, Bauer held Springfield to no hits through the fourth inning but found his team trailing 4-0. Milroy broke through for 10 runs in the fifth inning to break the game open.

Ross Ladehoff had another 2 for 3 game to lead the attack while Pat Spielman was 2 for 4 and Sean Castle had a home run.

In the championship game Sleepy Eye's Andy Cook bested Milroy's Brett Jackson to take a 10-2 victory.

VFW baseball can't rally from early deficit

The Tracy VFW baseball team lost to Hector last Thursday 10-7. Tracy's league record is 3.5.

"We dug ourselves a deep hole in the first inning and we just couldn't get out of it," said Tracy Coach Bill Tauer. "

Hector had a big first inning scoring 5 runs to take a 5-2 lead . That lead mounted to 7-3 before Tracy put up 3 runs in the fifth inning to close to 7-6. However Hector scored 3 more runs in the sixth inng to more than match the 1 run Tracy put on the scoreboard in the seventh inning.

"The boys battled back but we couldn't come up with the big play in the late innings," observed Tauer.

Chris Swenson started and pitched 2/3 of an inning giving up 5 runs on 4 hits while walking 3. Lucas Walling relieved him and pitched 2 1/3 innings giving up 2 runs on 4 hits while walking 1 and striking out 2. Derek Daniels finished the game and gave up 3 runs on 3 hits while walking none and striking out 5.

Daniels banged out 3 hits in 4 times at bat to lead the 9 hit attack while Sean Castle went 2 for 4.

Junior Olympic team is in Texas for national tourney

Ten Balaton, Milroy, and Tracy area athletes are competing in the National U.S. Junior Olympic Volleyball Tournament in Houston, Texas, this week.

The team is competing in the tournament's 17-year-old division. The players are: Emily Miller, Krysta Tholen, Tessa Nelson, Tasha Lamb, Nicole Haecherl, Andrea VanMoer, Laura Lanoue, Rachel Gervais, Emily Scharfe, Sarah Fritz. Andy Leonard coaches the team.

The national tournament began Sunday, and continues through Wednesday. The team qualified for the tourney by placing high in an regional qualifier tournament this April.