LA CROSSE — The Central High School baseball team continued an unbeaten start to the season with a doubleheader sweep of Wisconsin Rapids on Saturday.
The RiverHawks (5-0) beat the Red Raiders 7-5 and 11-4 in games played at a cold and windy Copeland Park.
Central scored once in the fifth inning and once in the sixth to break a 5-5 tie that Wisconsin Rapids forced with four runs in the top of the fifth in the first game.
Right fielder Kenden Bishofsky led off the bottom of the fifth with a home run, and the second of two straight errors allowed the sixth-inning run to score for Central.
The RiverHawks also scored five runs in the second inning and needed just two hits to do it. Eleven batters stepped into the box in the second, and Central took advantage of four walks, two hit batters and two passed balls to put together its big inning.
Bishofsky and left fielder/second baseman Jordan Candahl both singled for the RiverHawks. Bishofsky and catcher Charlie Buxton — he walked — both scored on passed balls. A walk to shortstop/pitcher Aiden Schulze scored courtesy runner Mitchell Lund, Candahl’s single scored third baseman/shortstop Beckett Allert, and center fielder Landon Smith scored when second baseman/shortstop Liam Branson was hit by a pitch.
Schulze was 2 for 3 with a double and a stolen base, and Candahl and Bishofsky both 2 for 4. Branson drove in two runs for Central.
The RiverHawks had a five-run third inning in the second game. They added four runs in the fourth and three in the fifth.
Candahl was 3 for 4 with a double, a stolen base and two runs driven in. Allert also drove in two runs, Bishofsky doubled, and Schulze stole two more bases.
First baseman Sam Blegen drew three walks and scored three runs in the second game.
Allert allowed two earned runs on two walks and four hits while striking our one batter over six innings.
