Manhattan ? The Lawrence High baseball squad played the entire season under the saying “Get up! You’re not hurt.” But after their 5-4 loss to Manhattan High on Tuesday, the Lions won’t have another chance to get up this season. And they most definitely were hurting.

Besides a nightmarish second inning, LHS looked like the team to beat on the diamond in the regional championship game. But they just couldn’t overcome a five-run inning by the Indians, in which three of the runs were unearned.

“I believe we dominated that game, except the second inning,” senior Brian Heere said. “They score five runs. Without that inning we would have kicked their (butt).”

The game wasn’t lost due to the Lions’ pitching; it was the three errors in the field that cost them.

Lions starter Joe Kornbrust was pulled in the bottom of the second and was credited with the two earned runs. Senior Daren Parker came in to finish the game and saw two of the three unearned scores come across the plate – both coming on the same error.

Lawrence High's Michael Sickinger slides into Manhattan's Dusty Hess, breaking up a possible double play. After winning their tourney opener earlier in the day, the Lions lost 5-4 on Tuesday to the Indians in a Class 6A regional final at Manhattan.

“You can’t do that with Manhattan, they’re too good of a team to give them four or five outs an inning,” LHS coach Brad Stoll said. “Our kids pitched well today, we just didn’t play good defense early. But then we settled down and well, hell, we out-hit them, but we didn’t win the game.”

However, LHS couldn’t pick up the slack at the plate. The Lions managed to get runners on, just couldn’t get them all the way around, having left 15 runners on base. The biggest one was the potential tying run in the top of the seventh – Daniel Parker – being left 60 feet from home.

“The third outs just came at the wrong time,” Daren Parker said. “I mean, we had everyone at the plate that we wanted to be up to bat. But that’s what happens – it happens.”

Heere tried his best to extend his final year wearing a Lion on his chest, but his 2-for-4 night with a triple, a run scored and an RBI, fell short of what he wanted.

“That last at bat I think I was just too overly aggressive,” said Heere, who grounded out for the second out of the seventh inning. “I just wanted to get it done. I wanted to finish the game, just with that one at-bat and I can’t do that. So, I swung at it – a curveball that was going to be low.”

Lawrence High's Tyler Knight knocks the ball loose going to second base as Manhattan's Dusty Hess drops the ball.

As the seniors huddled together with Stoll following the game, the other Lions players were just as emotional as the eight players that finished their careers at LHS on a down note.

Stoll said the strongest feeling he had following the game was selfishness.

“That’s about as good of a senior class that I’ve been around in a long time as a coach,” the LHS coach said. “Selfishly, I’m very bummed that I don’t get to go to practice with them tomorrow, because I love those kids. They left their stamp on this program and a pretty good legacy for these sophomores and juniors and I just hate to see them go.”

LHS went through Topeka High, 8-2, to get to the regional championship game. Daniel Green earned the win despite being ejected from the game in the fifth inning for hitting a batter after he had been warned by the home-plate umpire.

John Novotny went 2-for-2 with an RBI and a run scored in the first game. Senior Brett Sims was the main source of the Lions’ run production having batted in two runners and scoring once himself.

“We’re a tight bunch of kids and I hate to see it end,” Heere said. “I didn’t want it to end at all. That’s the last thing I wanted to do.”