Lawrence Raiders’ coach Carl Brooks would have made a good counselor Tuesday night.

He didn’t berate his team after one of its most lopsided losses of the season. He just calmly talked about what went wrong.

A lot did go wrong Tuesday at Free State High. The Raiders, who have just a week left before American Legion zone play begins, were crushed, 18-5, by the Kansas City Grays in a six-inning, run-rule game.

“Sometimes you just have to be philosophical about the situation,” Brooks said. “I’m not going to dog my boys. Clearly they (Grays) are a good ball club. Sometimes you have to give the devil his due.”

Well the Grays certainly didn’t resemble the red demon in appearance, as they were decked out in their baggy, old-fashioned gray uniforms.

But they sure stung the Raiders with a hot bat, collecting 17 hits in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings after falling behind early, 4-0.

In the top of the fourth, the KC team caught fire. The Grays lit up three Lawrence pitchers by scoring nine runs off nine hits as 14 players came to the plate in the inning.

Three more runs crossed in the fifth and Kansas City added another six runs in the sixth.

The Grays implemented the run-rule victory with the help of 33 batters from the fourth through sixth innings.

“They sure can hit the ball,” Brooks said. “Heck you take the five errors off the board that we had, and they still run-rule us.”

But Brooks, whose team entered Tuesday with the same record it had last year, 25-15, wasn’t going to make excuses for the Raiders’ third loss to the Grays.

“They just flat out can hit,” he said. “I’m not going to make up anything. We just got kicked tonight. I hope teams out there weren’t making up things when we were on a tear scoring 15 and 16 runs and beating everybody.”

But the Raiders could have a tough road with games away from home today and Thursday against KC Post 199 and Blue Valley West respectively, before meeting Olathe East on Friday at Free State.

“We can reinvent momentum in a day or two,” he said.

Kyle McManness opened the game with a walk and scored on a double by Derek Bailey. Matt Berner roped another single and Troy Wingert walked.

Tommy Mangino then hit a sacrifice fly that scored Bailey. The Raiders concluded their scoring off a double steal with Berner sliding under a close tag at home.

That was almost half the offense Lawrence produced Tuesday as the Raiders came up with one more run in both the second and fifth innings.

But Brooks, whose team made it to the state tournament last summer, said the loss won’t harm his team’s confidence in the final week.

“That’s baseball. It’s going to be that way sometimes,” he said. “You just have to bounce back.”

Grays 18, Lawrence Raiders 5

Grays 000 936 Â 18 18 0

Raiders 310 01x  5 7 5

W Â Erik Moore. L Â Ben Bieker.

Raiders Highlights: Derek Bailey 2-4, 2 RBIs, 1 run; Dallas Worley 1-2, RBI, run.