By NICK McQUEEN

nmcqueen@dailynews.net

A storybook ending was in place for the Hays High School baseball team in Tuesday night's title game at the Class 5A Regional Championships at HHS field.

Two outs, bottom of the seventh, trailing by a run, and one of your season's best hitters and senior leaders at the plate, but the story had a bad ending for Indian faithful.

Hays High did everything it could against a McPherson team that had beaten the Indians earlier in the season, but it was just the little things that beat the Indians in a 3-2 loss.

"Baseball is not an easy game to play,"¬ said Hays High coach Frank Leo, who wrapped up his 28th season at the helm of the Indians. "Anybody that has played it and been around it, you have to do a lot of things in tough situations.

"Our guys did that to get to 17-5," he added.

That's where it ended.

The Indians surrendered a 2-1 lead in Tuesday's title game, and McPherson senior reliever Josh Piper did the rest. After coming in with one out in the fourth inning, the right-hander retired 11 straight batters, sending the Bullpups to the Class 5A state tournament next week at Wichita's Lawrence-Dumont Stadium.

"We have to hang on to that and what our guys did," Leo said. "Today, that's a state championship-type game. That McPherson club has got a good shot to do some damage at state."

Hays High (17-5) had things going its way through four innings Tuesday. Indian junior starter Logan Downing gave up just one Bullpup run on four hits before being relieved by senior left-hander Nathan Meier to start the fifth, protecting a 2-1 lead.

"The pitching was there,"¬ Leo said. "In a 3-2 ball game, you have good pitching. Unfortunately, we made a couple mistakes in one inning and they capitalized on it."

After Meier struck out the first batter he faced on three pitches, senior third baseman Sam Rohleder took a shot off the knee cap for a single. Meier walked the next batter, putting runners at first and second. Piper, who bats left-handed, came to the plate and sent a grounder down the right-field line that got just under the glove of Hays High senior first baseman Taylor Pfannenstiel, scoring the tying run from second. With runners at the corners, Meier (1-3) got Bullpup senior Sam Stucky to hit a high-chopper to third base that the Indians almost turned into a double play to end the inning. Instead, the Bullpups (17-5) scored a run to take the lead.

"That's the game of baseball," Leo said. "It's such an interesting game for things like that.

"This was an outstanding baseball game, nothing for our guys to be disappointed about."

The result was a 3-2 McPherson lead after 4Ôªø1âÑ2 innings. In the Indians' fifth, Josh Piper, in relief of starter Joel Piper, struck out three batters and then fanned two more Indians in the sixth.

After walking the bases loaded in the McPherson sixth, Meier was pulled for Sam Rohleder, who got the Indians out of the jam.

"Our seniors have led this club all year long. They were determined,"¬ Leo said. "They gave it their best shot and as a coach, that's all you can ask kids to do."

Facing a 3-2 deficit in its last at-bat, Hays High had the top of its order, with senior Matt Malott leading off the inning. Malott grounded out to the first baseman, then junior Kelton Rule hit the ball hard, but it was caught by McPherson right fielder Levi Gerhardt, who made a running catch near the foul line.

That set up Sam Rohleder with the final at-bat.

Rohleder worked the count full before nearly beating out a ground ball to second base, ending the game and the Indians' season.

"Baseball is not a game about hitting the ball hard," Leo said. "It's about execution, and they executed."

Hays High scored its two runs in each of the first two innings on an RBI single by senior Austin Klaus in the first and an RBI single for Rule in the second. Klaus ended the game going 2-for-3 with a double and a strikeout, one of 11 for the Indians in the game. All of them were swinging. Rule was 2-fo-4 in the title game with one strikeout.

Hays High 8, Emporia 4

To make Tuesday's title game, the Indians got help from Sam Rohleder in the seventh inning of the opener. Malott, who moved to 4-0 on the year, recorded two outs in the seventh inning but gave up two runs. Rohleder picked up his fourth save of the season by striking out the final batter with the bases loaded to send Hays High to the title game.

"I can't be any prouder of this ball club and what they did this year," Leo said.

Hays High took a 1-0 lead after a leadoff double in the third inning by junior catcher Jay Sanders. Sanders' courtesy runner, Jayme Orth, scored on an error by Emporia (5-16). With two runners on, Pfannenstiel gave the Indians a 4-0 lead with his three-run home run to left-center.

The Indians had a 7-0 lead before the Indians allowed a run on an error. Malott also allowed an RBI double by Emporia catcher Harrison Stone to make it 7-2.

Sanders went 2-for-3 with two doubles. Pfannenstiel drove in three runs with his third home run of the season.

Tourney notes

* The 3-2 loss in the tile game was only the second time the Indians scored fewer than three runs this season. The first time was the season-opening 5-2 loss to Salina South. The Cougars fell 8-1 to McPherson in Tuesday's other semifinal.

* In the fourth inning against McPherson, Malott stole second after reaching base on a walk. The steal was Malott's 23rd of the season, moving him into a tie for second place on the single-season list under Frank Leo. Ian Mabb stole 23 in 2000, when the Indians were runners-up in Class 5A.

* Josh Piper made relief appearances in both games for McPherson Tuesday. In six innings of relief, he gave up just one hit and had nine strikeouts.

* The six wins by Downing ties him for eighth on the single-season list for Hays High. He now has 10 for his career with one season left. The career record for wins in the Leo era is held by Josh Shelton with 15 from 1997-99.

* Six Indian seniors played their final game for Hays High. All were starters this season.

"We have some shoes to fill, but we had some young guys get their feet wet this year," Leo said. "Our seniors showed them a lot of good things this year that they'll have to do to keep the Indian pride rolling."