PORTAGEVILLE, Mo. -- A furious rally from the Twin Rivers baseball team came to a screeching halt with one gut-wrenching web gem Tuesday night.
After digging themselves into a sizeable hole early in the MSHSAA Class 3 playoff, the Royals put the tying runs on with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning.
Zac Hardin appeared to pull Twin Rivers right back in it with one swing, but his hard-hit line drive to left-center field was robbed by a diving Ryan Priggel to give Portageville a 6-4 win.
"I thought that one was down but their left fielder made probably the catch of his life," Twin Rivers coach Jared Stockton said. "If that gets down it scores two for sure and maybe Zac gets in because he was rounding second.
"I thought we were looking at a completely different game after he hit it."
Trailing 6-2 and down to their final two outs, Twin Rivers (9-8) got help from the bottom of the order as No. 7 hitter Dakota Kendle cut the lead in half with an RBI single. Jalen Hicks followed with another RBI hit to trim the deficit to 6-4 before Hardin stepped to the plate.
After working a 1-1 count against Portageville relief pitcher Bub Lance, the junior split the gap in left-center as Priggel and center fielder Ian Torrey converged on the ball. Torrey slid in under Priggel, who dove over his teammate and bobbled the ball before securing it in his glove to end the game.
"I just played my regular depth, and normally Torrey gets any fly ball hit his way but I guess I just got lucky," Priggel said. "I saw him coming in on it but we didn't communicate on it at all. I was just gunna go for it and try to make a play on it, and I got lucky."
An inning earlier, the Royals had another chance to break through as they loaded the bases with two outs. Hicks and Jackson Siebert drew back-to-back one-out walks before Hardin smoked his first line drive directly at Torrey for out No. 2. Three pitches later, David Deken singled to load the bases setting up Baylen Teague, who sent another rope to Torrey to end the inning.
It was the story of the night for the Royals, who left the bases loaded in the bottom of the first, stranded 12 runners -- at least one in every inning -- and couldn't come up with the big hit.
"We just couldn't get hits when we needed them and they did," Stockton said. "It's just kind of how the game went for us and it's unfortunate."
After Teague sat Portageville (20-7) down in order in the first, the Bulldogs got to him. Connor Barham broke a scoreless tie in the second with an RBI double and scored two batters later on Bailey Cook's single for a 2-0 lead. Torrey started and helped himself with a two-run single to double the advantage an inning later.
Twin Rivers finally broke through against Torrey in the bottom half of the third when Teague, his counterpart, doubled to the wall in center to score Deken, who led off with a walk. LeGrand followed with a single to cut the lead in half.
Barham beat Teague again in the sixth with a leadoff solo home run. Teague got the final three outs of the inning and one more to begin the seventh before reaching his pitch-limit.
The senior gave up five runs on seven hits with five strikeouts and two walks in his final game with the Royals.
Hardin replaced Teague and walked the first two he faced before an error allowed Portageville's final run to score.
"The Barham kid hit two on the nose off of him but nothing else was hit hard," Stockton said. "I'd take Baylen any day of the week against anybody and you can't ask for much more from him."
Twin Rivers will lose four seniors to graduation and a group of players that has helped orchestrate a turnaround and lay a foundation for their younger teammates.
"When we won that district, I got choked up because we were 3-16 and we turned it completely around in a year or two," Stockton said. "I talked to these seniors a lot about what kind of legacy they wanted to leave, and now they can move on with their heads held high because they brought Twin Rivers back to the top."