Laramie Rangers Survive and Advance at State Tournament

The Laramie Rangers bats came to life and combined with a good pitching performance from Abel Casas, it added up to an 11-1 victory over the Cody Cubs Thursday at the 2012 Wyoming American Legion Baseball State Tournament in Casper. Laramie pounded out 21 hits en route to the 10-run victory in only 8 innings of play.

The victory means the Rangers survive and advance in the loser’s bracket at the state tournament. Laramie (30-19) will face another loser out game Friday at 4 pm. They’ll play the Sheridan Troopers (48-10) for the second time in three days. They lost to the Troopers in Wednesday’s state tournament opener. The winner will advance to Saturday morning’s Single-A Legion Baseball State Championship game against the Wheatland Lobos.

After Cody (30-35) plated the first run of the game in the 3rd, Laramie responded with four runs in the bottom of the frame and took the lead for good. Tommy Johnson hit a rbi-single, Chance Jones belted a 2-run triple and Casas followed with another rbi-single for a 4-1 lead. The Rangers added a run in the 5th and tacked on 3-more in both the 7th and 8th innings.

Casas threw 150 pitches and lasted into the 8th inning. He gave up one run on seven hits, walked three and struck-out seven.

Offensively, Jones led the way with three hits and 3 rbi for Laramie. Alex Jordan, Kevin Dooley and Drew Burman also had three hits apiece.

The Rangers game against Sheridan will be live on KOWB (AM 1290), online here and on your mobile device starting at 3:45 pm Friday. David Settle will call the action from Mike Lansing Field in Casper.