Conway's Austin Rainey effective in second appearance on mound in 10-7 victory against Bentonville in Arkansas 6A baseball title game

Rainey pitched the final two innings, shutting down the Tigers after starting the game and moving to the outfield.

By Jeff Halpern | Photos by Tommy Land  

BENTON — Austin Rainey saved the day for the Conway Wampus Cats (20-9) in a 10-7 victory over Bentonville (22-11) in the Class 6A state championship game at Panther Stadium. 

Rainey, who was named MVP of the state final, pitched the first two innings, then moved to center field after Hugh Hill came in in the third inning. After Bentonville had closed to 9-6 in the fourth, he came in and pitched the final 3 2/3 innings and didn’t allow a run as the Wampus Cats went on to win their third state title in school history and first since 2011.

“We knew it was going to be a tough game,” said Rainey. “When Coach brought me back in, he told me to stay up and keep playing baseball — nothing changes.”

For the game, Rainey allowed no runs on 2 hits in 5 2/3 innings with 3 strikeouts and 4 walks on 91 pitches. He retired 10 of the last 14 batters he faced after he relieved Hill, who struggled in 1 1/3 innings. Hill gave up 7 runs on 4 hits with 2 walks and 1 strikeout on 49 pitches.

Conway head coach Leighton Hardin said numerous times in the year, Rainey would start and give way to a reliever before coming back in.

“We’ve been doing that all year,” Hardin said. “We wanted to start with him and then bring in a reliever and have him as an insurance policy. What he did today takes guts. It’s not easy to start and then go sit in center field and then come back in.”

In the fourth inning with Conway leading 9-3, Bentonville’s Jackson Hutchens flied to right to start the inning, Rowan Christensen doubled, Carter Nye was hit by a pitch and Ethan Arnold walked to load the bases. Luke Crumpler doubled down the right-field line to clear the bases to make it 9-6.

At that point, Rainey came back into the game. After walking Keiper Pate, Stephon Gryskieewicz had a sacrifice fly to score Crumpler to make it 9-7. Tony Woodie grounded to short to end the inning.

When asked if there was anything he saw different about Rainey when he came back in, Bentonville Head Coach Todd Abbott said, “I don’t know. It seemed like we hit some balls right at him and he did a good job of throwing strikes.”

When asked if there was anything different about coming back to the mound in the fourth inning, Rainey said, “Adrenaline, the only thing I can say. It gets faster as the game goes on and I’m lucky I can play this game.”

Conway added one last run in the fifth inning when Preston Prock doubled to right to score Conner Cunningham. The Wampus Cats turned away a Bentonville rally in the bottom of the fifth. With two out and a runner on first, Nye beat out a ground ball to short, however, Conway first baseman Will Thompson threw across the diamond to the third baseman Tucker Satterfield, who tagged out Connor Kneeshaw who was running for Christensen.

Rainey was aided by his offense that gave him a 4-0 lead in the first inning. Logan French opened the bottom of the first with a double to right. After Rainey grounded to short, Tucker Satterfield tripled to right to score French to make it 1-0. After Cole Glover was hit by a pitch and Zach Scuba struck out looking, Thompson drilled a three-run home to right to make it 4-0.

“Will stepped into the starting lineup in our last regular season game when our first baseman [Preston Ribbing] broke his foot and I knew he was capable and he kept producing,” said Hardin.

Thompson, who went 2-for-3 with 4 RBI, said, “This is a dream come true to hit a home run in the state tournament. It felt great to be able to contribute to a great group of guys.”

After Rainey moved to center field to start the third, Bentonville closed to 4-3 off Hill. Nye walked and Arnold was hit by a pitch. After Crumpler’s sacrifice bunt moved both runners to second and third, Pate singled up the middle to score Nye to make it 4-1. Gryskiewicz followed with a two-run to right to score Arnold and Pate to make it 4-3 as Hill struggled through an inning in which he had to throw 39 pitches.

Conway answered with five in the bottom of the third. After Rainey led off with a double and stole third. After a walk to Tucker Satterfield, Abbott pulled Zac Soholsky and brought in Hayden Nall. Glover had a sacrifice fly to score Rainey to make it 5-3. Szuba followed with a double which moved Tucker Satterfield to third. Thompson followed with a single to right to score Tucker Satterfield to make it 6-3 and move Lake Satterifeld, who was running for Szuba to third. Cunningham singled to left to score Lake Satterfield to make it 7-3. After Prock struck out, Sam Gregg singled to left to score Thompson and Cunningham to make it 9-3.

While Bentonville got all of hits runs off Hill, Abbott said getting down 4-0 was a big hole to climb out of. He said, “What didn’t help us today was we got ourselves in a hole. We got to within run and then we had another big inning and put up a zero the rest of the game.

“It was a good baseball game, and I couldn’t be prouder of our players for the way we came back. This group plays for each other and had some ups and downs, but this is a really special group and showed what it was capable of doing.”

Crumpler and Gryskiewicz led the Tigers by going 1-for-3 with 3 RBI.

With Hardin in his second year at Conway, he was proud of the way his team came together to win a state championship.

“I didn’t think we’d do it in year two, however, the kids bought I and did a great job,” he said.