By Dan Weber
NKyTribune sports reporter
LEXINGTON – With 20 wins in their last 22 games, and 12 straight, Ryle’s Raiders were building up some serious season-ending mojo. That momentum sent the team from Union, champions of the Ninth Region, to their first-ever state tournament win Friday.
And got them right where they’ve wanted to be, where they’ve worked 32 years to reach — their first-ever quarterfinals Saturday with an impressive 32-9 record against another 32-9 team – uh oh – McCracken County’s Mustangs.
But that western Kentucky team in pinstripes – yeah, like the Yankees – has built themselves something of an insta-powerhouse program with more than just momentum. In the decade since McCracken County joined the KHSAA, the Mustangs have – wait for it – made the 290-mile trip from outside Paducah to Lexington every single season. Haven’t missed even one.
With its all-time state tourney record of 1-2 in 33 years now since becoming a KHSAA school, Ryle was going head-to-head with a program that’s 16-8 all-time in its 10 state tournaments even if McCracken’s “all-time” goes back only for the last 10 state tournaments.
All the Mustangs, with their incredible 53-man KHSAA roster, need now is a state title. Like Northern Kentucky teams over the last decade, they’ve stopped at that elusive championship game, but have made it to the semifinals four of the last six seasons.
All the Raiders wanted was one more win – and a chance to come back next week.
But they were a bit-overmatched Saturday, falling 4-1, although Ryle did record the day’s highlight with a tremendous home run shot off the bat of Raider AJ Curry, the state’s leading hitter at .580.
Going against the Mustang’s ace, left-hander Caleb Ehling, the left-swinging Curry picked on a curve ball, the kind that fooled him completely on his first-at-bat strikeout and crushed it an estimated 400 feet into the tarp above the Pepsi Party Deck high above the right field fence for what would have been a home run in every major league baseball stadium.
“After the first curve ball he threw me that had me turning my back on it, I said if he throws it again, I’m going to hit it,” Curry said. And did. So excited was sophomore Curry, he missed first base as he followed the ball, having to circle around and touch it on the way back to touching them all.
But that was it. The Raiders were one run and done as McCracken County moves into next Friday’s semifinals against Owensboro Catholic, a 2-1 winner over Hopkinsville.
As for Ryle, “this senior class has put us on the map, they’ve put in the work,” said Coach Joe Aylor, noting that this game was a matchup of the state’s top two pitching staffs.
The problem for the Raiders: While Ryle had used up its one-two guys (starter Sam Eppley with a second-inning injury to his elbow and Dylan McIntyre to throw the next 5 2/3 innings, McCracken County could hold out its ace – lefthanded junior Ehling – for the Raiders.
“It shows how much respect they have for us,” Aylor said of a program whose last trip to the state tournament before this year – in 2013 – was a year before there was even a McCracken County High School from consolidating Heath, Reidland and Lone Oak high schools.
But if there was a difference in this game, it was the crafty lefty Ehling, who kept Ryle hitters off-balance with his control, change of speeds and breaking ball. He struck out seven – five on swings against balls in the dirt – and walked just one, allowing Ryle just three hits.
“He was a great pitcher,” Curry said, “except for that one pitch.”
Ryle had no such luck. McCracken County made the Raiders pay, parlaying their lone extra-base hit – a first inning Miller Green triple with an infield hit and an error into a two-run lead that stood up against starter and Friday closer Caleb Mann, named to the All-Tournament team after earning the win with his arm and extra-inning two-run RBI single against East Carter.
Then in the sixth, McCracken put this one away, as good teams do, scoring the leadoff two walks with a sacrifice bunt and ground single through the middle from Kendrick Dunning.
“We had three or four hits right to guys,” Aylor said, but this one had the feel that it was just not meant to be. “Their pitcher kept us guessing like yesterday,” Aylor said of all the change-of-speed stuff.
And now the Ryle players were heading home after telling one another goodbye and thanks for a great season.
“We’re all family,” said Curry, who transferred in this year from San Diego and had “way more fun than last year” with a group of teammates that were “like brothers from another mother.”
“They were there for each other since Day 1,” Aylor said, “this (program) is home to a lot of people – a 30-year family.”
FOOTNOTED: The Friday injury to senior starter Eppley’s right throwing arm turns out to be “a fractured elbow . . . a freak thing,” Aylor said. “It (the fracture) had been growing for quite a while.” But it should have no impact on Eppley’s ability to move on to Xavier next year and play baseball. “It’s the best possibility for him,” Aylor said.
SCORING SUMMARY
RYLE 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 – 1 3 2
MCCRACKEN CO 2 0 0 0 2 0 X – 4 7 1
WP: Ehling (8-1) LP: Mann 7-2
LEADING HITTERS: Ryle: Curry, HR, RBI. McCracken County: Green triple, 2 RBI; Gree 2-3, Hawes 2-3.
Contact Dan Weber at dweber3440@aol.com. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @dweber3440.