GRAND CHUTE – The Waupun baseball team stood at the top of the concourse at Neuroscience Group Field at Fox Cities Stadium, lined up down the third base side. Eyes swelled, tears fell as many stared into the distance.
Waupun’s season had just come to an end with a 5-3 loss to Kenosha St. Joseph in the WIAA Division 2 state tournament semifinals.
“It’s going to hurt when it comes to an end. But at some point they’re going to be able to look back at all we did. Look at all the fun times we had,” Waupun head coach Travis Hull said. “We started at Myrtle Beach this year to finishing at the Timber Rattlers stadium.”
With the loss, Waupun’s season ended with a 23-6 record and as the Capitol-North conference champions. The Warriors made it back to state for the first time since 2018 after making it to sectionals the three seasons prior.
The game was initially slated to start at 9 a.m., but with impending weather was moved to 8 a.m. and started a few ticks ahead of time.
“You work so hard to put a schedule together. We had a dinner set up at 7 (p.m.) after we did a bell ringing thing at our school,” Hull said. “Then it was like ‘Okay, gotta be here at eight now.’ So that means the bus is leaving at 5:45 (a.m.), and batting practice at 5:15 (a.m.). But they handled it great. Honestly, it was probably the most fun bus ride we’ve had all year. The energy was up, they were excited. They all went to bed at a decent time.”
Waupun was ready to go early as clouds crowed the sky and fans filled their seats. In the top of the second inning Waupun struck first as it scored on an error.
“Starting with the early morning game, you’re not really going to have the energy and we wanted to make sure the energy was on our side to start the game,” Waupun senior Grahm Gopalan said.
Kenosha St. Josesph was scoreless in the first two innings before LSU commit Dominic Santarelli sent a ball over the right centerfield fence to go ahead 2-1.
Waupun freshman Sutton Nelson got the start on the mound and delivered 5.1 innings with nine strikeouts while allowing five hits and five earned runs.
“He’s mature beyond his freshman year. He even swung a good bat today,” Hull said. “I didn’t worry, otherwise I wouldn’t be starting him in game one of the state tournament. That’s how he’s been all year. He’s going to go after guys, he struck Dominic out in the first at bat.”
Dealing for Kenosha St. Joseph was Zach Rizzo and in five innings pitched he had four strikeouts and allowed three hits and one earned run.
Waupun showed some fight at the end and came close to extending the game with a run in the top of the seventh and a runner stranded.
“I wasn’t at any point concerned they were going to go up there and battle and strikeout. They were going to battle. It’s what they’ve done all year and I’m super proud of them,” Hull said.
There were seven seniors on the roster for Waupun, many of which played key roles and have played together since they were seven years old. Hull got a first-hand look at the ride they’ve taken since those first swings with his son Emmett being a part of the senior class.
“Having coached these boys since they were like seven years old, a lot of them and then the new ones that have filtered in through the years, that’s tough. I was handling things really well and then you kind of look around and you look and you’re like, ‘Hey, last time I get to coach these boys,’” Hull said. “We knew they were a special group as young kids and they worked extremely hard and there’s going to be good things for those young men in their future.”
Contact or send game stats/info to Ben Schultz at BSchultz@usatodayco.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @benschultz52.
This article originally appeared on Oshkosh Northwestern: Waupun baseball battles until the end, falls to Kenosha St. Joseph
Reporting by Ben Schultz, Oshkosh Northwestern / Oshkosh Northwestern
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Ben Schultz, Oshkosh Northwestern | USA TODAY Network
