Madison Legion Drops 5-6 Decision to La Crosse Northstars

On a humid day with an abundance of thunder storms, the Madison Legion baseball team fell just short of knocking off the traditionally-strong La Crosse Northstars. Madison and La Crosse originally had a doubleheader scheduled at Murphy Park in Waunakee, but ended up playing just one 9-inning game due to the weather and travel considerations for La Crosse.

Madison sent Madison Edgewood '11 graduate Sam Wood to mound, and he threw well, keeping Madison in the game in the 4.0 innings of work. Wood gave up just 2 runs on 2 hits, struckout 2 and walked three. 2011 Madison LaFollette graduate Zach Furniss took a tough loss to drop to 0-1 on the season as he gave up 3 earned runs on 5 hits, striking out 2 La Crosse hitters in 3.0 innings of work. The ball was then handed off to Chas Schuster who impressively mowed down the La Crosse hitters in the 8th and for the first out in the 9th before the game was called due to safety concerns with the impending weather.

Madison struck first in the bottom of the 3rd inning when Tony Grannis singled, and was brought home on a groundball to short from Zach Addamo. La Crosse responded with two runs of their own in the top of the 4th to take a 2-1 lead before Madison put together a 3-run inning in the bottom of the 4th led by singles from Sam Abbott, Chris Anderson and Nick Zwieg. La Crosse responded once again with two more runs in the top of the 5th to tie the game at 4. La Crosse added two more runs in the top of the 7th to increase their lead to 6-4. Madison cut the lead to just one at 6-5 when Tony Grannis doubled to lead off the bottom of the 7th, stole third base, and was brought in on a sacrifice fly by Kevin Cobb. Madison's time ran out as the game was called due to safety concerns with the impending weather in the top of the 9th inning. Final Score: LaCrosse Northstars 6, Madison 5.

With the loss, Madison drops to 2-1 on the season. Next up for Madison is the Andy Smith Memorial Woodbat Tournament in Kenosha, WI. Madison will take on Lake in the Hill (IL) at 4:30pm on Friday, Richmond (IL) at 4:30pm on Saturday, and two opponents that are TBD on Sunday.