BURNSVILLE -- JD Kondos buckled down when it mattered most.
With the tying run on second base for Hopkins in the Burnsville Snakepit Tournament championship game, the Bemidji American Legion baseball pitcher fanned the final batter of the game and delivered the Centaurs a 6-5 victory on Sunday.
The win vaulted Post 14 to a 4-1 start to the season, which included some hardware at the culmination of the tournament.
The two pool-play winners met up on Sunday in the gold medal game, and Bemidji brought the lumber for an opening statement.
Brandon Lussier cracked a two-RBI double in the top of the first, and although Hopkins managed to tie in the bottom of the first, the Centaurs scored three more runs in the second inning for a 5-2 edge. Kondos doubled in the first run and later scored on an error, and Ben Corradi singled in Isaiah Biehn soon after.
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Biehn scored in the fourth inning off a Hopkins error, maintaining the lead at 6-3.
Kondos settled into a groove on the mound, retiring seven straight over the middle innings, but Ryan Mcgie and Cole Anderson disrupted the rhythm with solo home runs in the sixth inning that made it 6-5.
Post 14 went down quietly in the top of the seventh, but in the bottom half, Kondos worked around a two-out double and struck out Jack Muesser on three pitches to end the drama.
Kondos finished his complete game with two strikeouts, allowing five runs on 10 hits over seven frames. At the dish, he also had Bemidji’s lone multi-hit effort with his 2-for-3 day.
The Centaurs will be home for the first time this summer with a 4 p.m. doubleheader against East Grand Forks on Wednesday, June 23, at the BSU baseball field.
Bemidji 6, Hopkins 5
BEM 230 100 0 -- 6-7-0
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HOP 201 002 0 -- 5-10-2
WP: Kondos (CG, 7 IP, 10 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 0 BB, 2 K)
LP: Tomanek (2 IP, 5 H, 5 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 0 K)
