Muskego Impact Take Eastern Division Crown

The Impact wrapped up the Land O’ Lakes Eastern Division this past week when they beat Racine Kiwanis 16-7 on Tuesday night and their doubleheader slated against the New Berlin Lakes on Wednesday night was rained out.   Since all regular season games had to be played by July 31st and the results of the doubleheader had little impact on the playoffs, The Impact’s league record finished at 12-6 (17-7 overall) ahead of the Butler Bombers who finished at 12-8.  Both the Impact and Bombers drew a first round bye in the playoffs that started on Sunday.

In the game vs Racine Kiwanis, the Impact came out strong early in the game as the team played through some rain.  The Impact was up big 10-2, when Racine erupted for 5 runs in the bottom of the 6th inning to make a game of it.    However, it did not last long as the Impact tallied two runs in each of the last three innings to win going away.   The Impact pounded out 16 hits lead by Nick Schmidlkofer with 3 hits that included a triple, and Joe Kooping, Andy Liss, Jake Jewell, Nick Paffhausen and Sean Staral collected 2 hits each.  Jewell had two triples with 5 rbis and Paffhausen had a double with 4 rbis.  Dave Mihlsimmer picked up the victory going 5 and 1/3rd innings to improve his record to 6-2 as he allowed 5 runs on 7 hits, struck out 7, walked 2 and hit 2 batters.  Cole Borek picked up the save pitching the final 3 and 2/3rd innings allowing 2 runs on 4 hits, striking out 3 and walking 2. 

On Friday night, the Impact traveled to Horicon to compete in the semi-finals of the SWABA Tourney taking on Brownsville in an 8:45 pm game.  It was the second of two games played at the park that night and the bats were asleep as they could only muster one hit losing 4-0.  The Brownsville team picked up one run in the 2nd inning and that would be all that they needed, as their hurler Sam Wilhelms took a perfect game into the 6th inning when with one out, Mike O’Connor laced a base hit to right center.  Josh Beatka started and took the loss as his record dropped to 2-1.  He pitched 5 innings allowing 3 earned runs on 8 hits, striking out 5 and walking 3.  Jake Jewell pitched the final inning not allowing a run on2 hits, striking out 3 and walking one.

The Impact will travel to Harden Field on Wednesday night to take on the North Shore Knights who beat the West Allis Nighthawks on Sunday.  They will then return home to Horn Field next Sunday to again play North Shore continuing the best out of a three game series.