Kansas City, MO - The Grace Christian baseball team headed to Kansas City for the NCCAA NDAG (Non-Dually Affiliated Group) regional tournament this week to chase their goal of making the world series just a week later. Entering the tournament as the 6th seed, it would prove to be a challenging task ahead of them as they played the #3 seed, the #2 seed, and finally the #1 seed in their three games before bowing out due to the double elimination format. 

Game 1

The first draw came on Monday against #3 seeded Arlington Baptist University. Senior Brendan Bos took the mound for the Tigers and worked hard to keep Grace in it. Arlington scored 4 in the bottom of the second inning. Grace answered with one run of their own off an RBI triple by Damian Fernandez to bring the score to 4-1. Bos settled in for the third inning, throwing a scoreless frame, but got into more trouble in the bottom of the 4th inning. Bos left the game giving up 6 runs on 9 hits in 3.1 innings of work. Iwan Sitalo was able to clean things up and pitched the next 1.2 innings scoreless. Following a few more runs scored by Arlington later in the game, the Tigers were able to scratch one more across in the 7th on an RBI single by Eric Whiting, but that wouldn't be enough. The Tigers fell to the Patriots 9-2. 

Game 2

It was win or go home Tuesday for the boys as they faced #2 seeded Kansas Christian, who had also lost on Monday night. Kansas Christian had ended Grace's season in 2024's regional tournament, so the boys had an extra chip on their shoulder, and it showed. This game was all Tigers in the beginning. The Tigers scored two runs early in the second inning off an error and another Eric Whiting single. Again in the 4th inning, Grace put up two more runs on two sacrifice fly's to bring the lead to 4-0 heading into the 5th. Freshman Colin Nelson got the start on the mound for Grace and had thrown four scoreless frames before entering the 5th inning. An unexpected 3-run home run by Kansas Christian suddenly brought the score to 4-3, and the Falcons would plate one more before they were done, tying the game 4-4. John Sanocki came in as first relief for Nelson, and worked into a jam in the 6th, where Kaleb Blaskowski came into finish the job, getting a weak fly ball to left field to end the inning. In the bottom of the 6th, Grace exploded for three runs off another error by the Falcons, followed by a Damian Fernandez triple and a suicide squeeze RBI by Jared Garnaat, bringing the lead to 7-4 going into the final inning. Blaskowski finished the job for Grace, earning the win and forcing another elimination game later in the day. 

Game 3

Another upset in the tournament brought #1 seed Ecclesia College to the Tigers in another win or go home matchup. Grace picked up right where they left off with the bats and took an early 5-0 lead in the first inning of the game. Ecclesia however answered right back with 3 runs of their own off of Grace starter Michael Bontrager in the top of the second inning. Ecclesia would tie the game 5-5 in the 4th, and continue to add more as the game went on The Tigers had multiple chances with runners in scoring position but stranded them all. Though Grace pushed until the end, they couldn't plate another run and the game ended in a 9-5 loss. Senior Jared Garnaat had 2 hits in the game and a stolen base to go along with pitching 2.1 innings in relief. Freshman Ben Anderson and Sophomore Royce Frieburger also recorded two hits each in the game. 

That would cap off the fourth season in Grace baseball history. Coach Wolfe had this to say after the tournament, "The boys really battled through a lot of adversity this year. Losing our teammate Joe Leavitt over the winter was devastating, and clearly took its toll on the team early in the spring. I am proud of the boys for digging deep mid-season to find their identity again and find a way to play for Joe each and every game. We really reset mentally and proved to ourselves again what we can accomplish when we play as a team. In the end, we took some big steps forward this season as a program. The future is bright for Grace Christian."