Community R-6 rejoiced for its redemption on Tuesday.

Community R-6 vs Cairo District Title Photo Gallery

In the Class 1 District 12 championship game at Battle High School in Columbia, the Trojans defeated Central Activities Conference powerhouse and rival Cairo 3-0 behind seven innings of 10 strikeouts and five hits allowed by Mason Carroll, pitching Community to its first district title since 2001. 

“During practice, we practiced celebrating district championship wins as a joke,” senior Gavin Allen said. “We finally did it. Four years. COVID season freshman year so didn’t get to play. Sophomore year, lost in the championship. Last year, lost to Higbee. It feels so good.”

Head coach Joel Krato said he has asked his team whether they were playing at a “district championship level” all year and thinks that the Trojans (17-5) are indeed playing to that level while bringing a couple of the best arms in Class 1 to the table. Cairo (12-7) is a team that has experienced much success, including a third-place state trophy last year and more recently a 5-4 victory in nine innings against Community. That extra-inning loss prevented the Trojans from taking the conference title but felt bigger things were on the horizon.

“We’ve been talking about we’re the redeem team,” Krato said. “We watched the documentary about the 2008 Olympics (gold medal basketball team), and we had a lot of things to redeem. Cairo beat us to win the conference championship, and I said, ‘Boys, it sucks to lose conference, but would you rather have conference or districts? We’ll get a chance to redeem ourselves.”

Community certainly earned its redemption against Cairo in the rematch, defeating the Bearcats for the first time since the 2021 district semifinals. Krato recalls losing to Wellsville-Middletown for the championship that season and then being taken down in the semifinals the following year by Higbee and star pitcher Derek Rockett, who struck out 19 Trojans in that game. 

The Trojans not only defeated Rockett, who Krato said “might be the best Class 1 arm,” on Monday with the counter of Allen’s career-high 16 strikeouts but followed that with Carroll’s double-digit punchouts not even 12 hours after the conclusion of the 9:15 p.m. game at Battle’s field.

“I wanted to make them rollover,” Carroll said. “Throw fastballs in on them and see if the breaking ball made them rollover on it.”

Carroll encountered a lengthy first inning thanks to a pair hits by the Bearcats and a prolonged battle by Ryan Tracy before he became the third strikeout victim in the frame. 

Cairo had both college pitchers Logan Head and Hayden Holman — the pair that combined for 15 strikeouts in the first meeting and had 10 on Tuesday — Krato said he was a little concerned after seeing Carroll’s first inning because Allen was unavailable after the previous night. Fortunately, he said Carroll knows how to execute when not all of his pitches are working.

“After the first inning, I was worried we would run out of pitches so we changed our approach of going heavy curveball, because I thought they would sit fastball, and I said ‘Heck, you’ve got to win the game and gear back and throw fastballs for strikes,’” Krato said. “We threw 95 percent fastballs, and he still won. That’s incredible. He does a phenomenal job of throwing to the outer half.”

Carroll called Community’s first run in the fourth inning “huge” as he grew more confident when on the mound. Much like the previous night with passed balls, the Trojans were alert and ready to strike as Allen hustled down the line on a ground ball that was thrown past first base, allowing Eli Johnson to cross the plate from second base. Brant Cope came up later with two outs and placed a RBI single in the outfield for a 2-0 Community lead.

“We’re not pro athletes and are not going to make most of the balls we throw so you never know what could happen,” Allen said. “That hustle play probably rushed him up a little bit. It was a huge first run as the first run of the game is always huge.”

That particular play could be seen as redemption as well, Krato said, as he remembers for taking out his senior leader and star player for not hustling. He said that shows anyone is susceptible to discipline for not playing the proper way, which is vital as proven on Tuesday.

“I don’t care if you’re fast, slow or whatever,” Krato said. “You give me your best, and I’m going to give you my best. Let it play out. If he’s not hustling, if my kid jogs down the first base line and that kid makes the throw and then that kid catches it and tags first. Instead, he’s got to reach for it because it’s going to be a bang-bang play. It takes no talent to hustle.”

Allen hustled around the bases after driving a ball to the deepest part of centerfield, which Krato said would be a home run in Community’s ballpark among some other deep drives in the game, running in with a RBI double in the fifth inning. He said he expected a first-pitch fastball and saw it before crushing the ball to centerfield and giving the Trojans a big insurance run.

That helped Carroll’s mentality as he closed out the game in the seventh inning as Holman picked his second double of the game with one out away. A groundout and strikeout preceded the dogpile around the mound.

“I wasn’t worried about that because we were up 3-0, and all they had was one person on base,” Carroll said. “Oh well if they hit a home run. It wasn’t going to faze me.”

After knocking off three college arms in less than 24 hours and rising atop the “hardest Class 1 district in the state,” Krato said he likes his team’s chances against anybody they face in the future, starting with Northland Christian (16-7) at 4 p.m. Monday at Creekside Baseball Complex in Parkville.

“If we play this kind of baseball, we’re unbeatable,” Krato said. “We’ve already seen possibly the best arm you can see in Class 1. It doesn’t get any harder than that. We’ll face good teams, but I promise you that between Cairo and what we saw from Rockett, it doesn’t get much better than that.”