District softball

Mexico bats around in 15-0 district win vs Wright City

Mexico head coach Curt Riley was worried going into Tuesday.

His team had the No. 2 seed and was hosting its first-round Class 3 District 3 Tournament game against No. 7 Wright City but realized this was the second time the Lady Wildcats came up on the schedule. The Lady Bulldogs made those worries melt away after defeating Wright City 15-0 in four innings, scoring 10 runs in the second inning that saw 15 Mexico batters and eight hits.

Maddy Feger made the biggest impact on the inning, driving in all four of her runs and locking down three of them on one swing. Feger hit a three-RBI home run to give Mexico’s its first runs, which grew quickly following RBI from Jo Thurman, Abby Bellamy and Kierstan Epperson. Epperson finished 3-for-4 with three RBI and two doubles, Lexie Willer added three RBI and a double, and Eboni Mayfield pitched all four innings while allowing one hit and walk and striking out six — four looking.

Willer also drew the walk that led off the big inning that was the beginning of an all-around attack from the Mexico offense, Riley said, which was an encore to the 12-2 five-inning victory against the Lady Wildcats (9-17) on Oct. 1.

“We hit the ball well up and down the lineup,” Riley said. “It was a good effort.  I was a little worried about it coming in because it’s hard to beat somebody twice, but I thought the girls were really motivated and ready to play.”

Mexico (19-12) will have to wait until today’s result between No. 3 Bowling Green (19-9 and No. 9 in Class 3) and No. 6 Orchard Farm (10-12) after games were postponed due to wet weather Tuesday. Regardless of who the opponent is, the Lady Bulldogs are scheduled to play at 3:30 p.m. Thursday at Orchard Farm High School in St. Charles. The district semifinal game will also be Mexico’s attempt at its first 20-win season since 2018, when the Lady Bulldogs won 27 games on the way to a state title.

Boys soccer

Mistake leaks through in Mexico’s 1-0 loss vs Kirksville

Neither Mexico nor Kirksville played the type of defense that would lose a game Tuesday night.

Still, one of the North Central Missouri Conference and district foes had to lose, and it ended up being Mexico after Kirksville’s Will Tiedemann scored the winning goal in the 79th minute of the 1-0 loss to extend Mexico’s season-high streak to seven. The Bulldogs outshot Kirksville 13-11, and goalkeeper Emille Scanavino made nine saves.

Head coach William Gleeson said after Monday’s 8-0 mercy-rule result in Fulton — the fifth of four games against state-ranked opponents — Mexico (4-13, 1-7 NCMC) played much better, partly because its defense was more complete with the exception of Kevin Lopez, who was nursing a shoulder injury from Monday. Regardless, the defense was more stout than it had been in the previous week.

“It was a defensive game all the way around,” Gleeson said. “Just a little slip there with a minute left, but it was much better. I’m happy with the boys. They played well.”

The “little slip” occurred on Tiedemann’s goal when he found himself alone in front of the goal and then proceeded to boot in the deciding score. Gleeson said Tiedemann has a “great shot” that gave Kirksville (4-8-3, 3-5 NCMC) the winning goal late in a 2-0 loss Sept. 13.

“We just kind of lost that mark in the back,” Gleeson said. “Somebody should have been covering. The ball came back there, and we just didn’t see it and didn’t get it. We just lost our man basically.”

Mexico will be wrapping up its conference schedule soon with a home game Thursday against Hannibal (14-5, 6-1 NCMC) and a road contest Monday against Moberly (2-13-1, 1-7 NCMC). After that, though, the Bulldogs play two of their last three regular season games against district opponents — three of the last four if Moberly is accounted for. Mexico’s record against district foes this season fell to 2-5 after the loss to Kirksville.

Volleyball

Mexico aces senior night in sweep of Brookfield

Mexico honored its seniors Tuesday night the best way it could.

A sweep of Brookfield. The Lady Bulldogs earned its third three-set sweep of the season to win on Senior Night, taking the sets 25-5, 25-4 and 25-12 and finishing with 19 service aces.

No Lady Bulldog finished with double-digit kills, but Mexico’s serve was working so well for several players, including seniors Jessica Stephens’ and Ali Walotka’s team-high five, senior Aleigha Jackson’s four and Lizzie Joiner’s two. Stephens also led the team with eight kills and six digs. Joiner and senior Ally Wilson each had a team-high 11 assists.

Mexico’s hitting percentage in the second set outperformed its .417 percentage in the first set as the Lady Bulldogs owned a .625 percentage, making one error in the frame. The third set went down to .111, allowing Brookfield (1-10) to get as close as 16-12 prior to a 9-0 Mexico run to close the match.

Mexico (6-12-1, 3-3 NCMC) travels to North Central Missouri Conference foe Marshall (0-20, 0-7 NCMC) on Thursday before competing in the Eugene Volleyball Tournament on Saturday.

Cross country

Centralia sweeps home meet, Bostick wins second straight race

The Centralia cross country was already running with confidence after each of the teams and Jozelynn Bostick won a conference title.

About a week after that, the Centralia boys and girls swept the team awards Tuesday at the Centralia Invitational, winning with 22 and 23 points, respectively. Bostick won the girls 5,000 meters with a season-best time of 19:25 and was one of three Centralia girls in the top five and four in the top 10. JR Lesher took second in the boys 5,000 meters with a time of 16:54.1, making him one of three Centralia boys in the top five and four in the top 10 and breaking his own school record.

Bostick held off teammate Kenedee Moss, who ran a time of 19:54.3, to win on a windy and rainy day amongst 67 other runners. Among the other Centralia girls who finished in the top 20 to medal was Shelby Lewis with a fourth-place time of 20:39.4, Annie Robinson with a sixth-place time of 21:33.1 and Rylee Palmer with a 14th-place time of 22:38.1. Clarence Cannon Conference foe Macon was the second-place team with 47 points.

In the field of 74 runners, Lesher was only beaten by conference foe South Shelby’s Noah Wilt and his winning time of 16:47.3. The Centralia boys had five other medalists to win the team competition by a wide margin — 61 points less than runner-up Macon — including Landon Moss in fourth place with a time of 17:41.6, John Holiman in fifth with a time of 17:50.9, Carter Moss in sixth with a time of 17:53.8. Elijah Hill in 11th with a time of 18:14.5 and Dryst Bostick in 13th with a time of 18:19.1.

North Callaway finishes with four medals in Centralia

Not only did North Callaway take home four medals Tuesday, three also appeared in the top 10.

In the Centralia Invitational, Brendan Reinhard and Tristan Young finished seventh and ninth, respectively, out of 74 runners in the boys 5,000 meters, and Pressley Schmauch was eighth out of 68 runners in the girls 5,000 meters. Grace Rasmussen gave the Ladybirds another medalist after placing 18th to fall within the top 20.

Reinhard ran to a time of 18:03.5, and Young had a time of 18:13.5 to pace the boys that finished third in the team standings with 98 points. Centralia won the team prize with 22 points, and South Shelby’s Noah Wilt was the individual champion after racing to a time of 16:47.3.

Schmauch finished with a time of 21:43.8, and Rasmussen had a time of 23:09.2 to lead the girls’ fourth-place finish at 107 points. Centralia won the team crown at 23 points, and the Lady Panthers’ Jozelynn Bostick won the individual title with a time of 19:25.

Look for the full stories in the Oct. 15, 2022, edition of The Mexico Ledger and on the website on the same day. Additional note: District softball games for Community R-6, Van-Far and North Callaway are scheduled to be played today after being postponed yesterday due to weather. Centralia's district game against Southern Boone has been moved to Southern Boone in Ashland, still at 7 p.m., due to wet field conditions.