Mineral Wells on deepest playoff run since 1958
By DAVID MAY | Special to Mineral Wells Area News
COLORADO CITY – 1958 was a year marked by significant events in politics, science, culture and global affairs. NASA was born, as were pop stars Madonna, Michael Jackson and Prince. The first successful U.S. satellite was launched. The first transatlantic jet passenger service began.
It was also the last time the Mineral Wells Rams reached the Texas high school baseball regional finals. With one more series win, they would play in the state tourney finals for the first time in school history.
In another one-game, winner-take-all showdown, Rams ace Holden Hering fanned 10 West Plains Wolves and homered in the winning runs in Friday’s 3-1 Class 4A, Region 1 semifinals win in Colorado City.
“For the first time since 1958 the Mineral Wells Rams baseball team is in the Regional Finals!!! So proud of our players, coaches, and community!!” Mineral Wells Athletics Director Cody Worrell posted to his X account.
The Rams (20-10-1) now await the winner of the Seminole-Estacado series. Seminole took Friday’s best-of-three series opener, 6-4. Game Two and, if necessary, Game Three are scheduled for today at Frenship High School.
A Texas Tech signee, Hering was his usual dominant self on the bump, working 5.2 innings. The senior hurler allowed four hits and just two walks. The lone Wolves run that scored against him was unearned. He struck out 10 of the 24 batters he faced while throwing 109 pitches – 70 for strikes.
William Hollifield once again was sparkling in relief, getting the save by finishing off the Wolves perfectly with no runs, no walks, no hits and one strikeout to record the last four outs.
Mineral Wells grabbed a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first. With one out, Curry Crouch worked a walk. Hering collected the first of his two hits with a single. Braxton May was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Freshman Hayes Hering laid down a sacrifice bunt that scored courtesy runner Jackson Hicks.
The score remained 1-0 into the top of the fifth when West Plains knotted the affair with a two-out single and an error.
The Wolves unsuccessfully attempted a two-out steal of home in the top of the sixth. The steal attempt came after Hollifield took the mound in relief of Holden Hering. Rams catcher Crouch applied the tag to end the inning.
In the Rams’ half of the sixth, Crouch again worked a one-out walk. Hering stepped in to the box and launched a two-run home run over the center field wall for a 3-1 Mineral Wells lead.
Hollifield set the Wolves down in order in the seventh, inducing two fly outs and a strikeout to lock down the win.
West Point’s pitching ace Reid Macon went 5.1 strong innings, throwing one pitch to Hering he would like to have back. Macon surrendered two hits and all three earned runs over 5.1 innings, striking out five and walking two.
