Champion City scored one run in the sixth and two runs each in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings to complete the comeback.
“I’m kind of speechless right now,” said Kings manager Gavin Murphy. “These guys never gave up. 68 days and 60 games, it’s hard to keep them here. They could’ve very easily said ‘We’re just gonna go home, it was a good season.’ The fact that they chose to continue to battle and fight and want to win the game — we have a great group of guys. I’m blessed. They’re unreal. I’m ecstatic and kind of at a loss for words.”
The Kings trailed 9-8 heading into the bottom of the ninth inning. With one out, Mitchell Okuley smashed a home run over the center-field wall to tie the game.
“Luckily, I had a teammate in the dugout who thought he had the pitches, so he gave me a little hint there,” Okuley said. “They left one down the middle and I was able to take advantage of it. It felt absolutely awesome, especially for Springfield. They’ve never made the playoff before and to get them the first W in this fashion, there’s nothing better than that.”
Shawnee grad Ben Ross followed with a single and moved to third on a base hit by Brent Widder. The next hitter, first baseman Lukas Galdoni, lifted a sacrifice fly to center field, scoring Ross from third base to complete the comeback.
“I was just thinking when the pitch came in to put it in play,” Galdoni said. “If I put it in play, it gave us a good chance to win. I knew (Ben Ross) would score at third no matter what happened. As long as I got it out of the infield, I knew he was going to score.”
With the victory, the Kings advanced to face the Lafayette Aviators in the one-game, winner-take-all East Conference Championship Game on Saturday night in Lafayette, Ind. The winner will advance to face either the Cape Catfish or the Clinton LumberKings in the best-of-three Prospect League Championship series, which begins Monday.
Chillicothe took a 1-0 lead in the first inning, but the Kings quickly took a 2-1 lead on RBIs by Widder and Chase Carney. The Paints followed with three runs in the second inning and two runs in the third, chasing Kings starter Jake Miller from the game.
Northwestern grad Gage Voorhees picked up the victory, allowing three unearned runs on three hits with six strikeouts in six innings of work. Voorhees gave up a three-run home run to Chillicothe’s Nathan Karaffa in the fifth inning, but wouldn’t allow another run the rest of the way. “It means a lot to me to have the performance that I did, especially after letting up a three-run bomb,” Voorhees said. “Most importantly, it’s having the team behind my back who’s going to make plays, hit the ball and score runs. Everything that I accomplished tonight is solely based on the team. Everybody worked together, everybody came back.”
Widder went 4-for-4 with three runs scored, while Ross and Trey Carter each went 2-for-5. Kings catcher Bo Seccombe, Okuley and Carter each had two RBIs in the victory.
In the eighth inning, Kings assistant coach Mark Lucas was ejected for arguing. Ross reached first on a broken bat single, but was sent back to the batter’s box after the home plate umpire ruled the ball hit him. The ejection gave the Kings the extra motivation they needed to complete the comeback, Galdoni said.
“It changed the tide of the game,” he said. “He puts his whole heart out for this team. If he’s going to do it, why not us? He cares more than anything about this team and he does whatever he can for us. With how he feels about this team, it made everyone else say that we’ve got to go win this for Mark.”
The comeback was nothing new for the Kings, Galdoni said. They came from behind twice early in the season in Johnstown with just 13 players and continued to fight back from similar deficits the rest of the summer, he said.
“I think we realize that we’re never really out of the game and this team can come back and hit no matter what,” he said. “Starting off like that really helped us realize that no matter how far down we are, we’re always going to come back. Everyone in the lineup trusts the guy behind him.”
The Kings will now set their sights on the East Conference Championship game. Champion City split the season series against Lafayette, going 3-3 in six games.
“It was an absolute gutsy performance all the way around,” Murphy said. “The fans were electric tonight. They were unbelievable. Lafayette is a great team, they’re well-coached and they’re going to pitch and hit, but I’m taking my guys eight days a week.”
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