The Monticello Billies playoff appearance was on the line in the final two regular season conference games of the season.
After a win over Warren by the Hamburg Lions, a win over Star City by Hamburg would have sealed the Billies fate before their final games even began, and for a brief minute it looked as if Monticello would be eliminated from contention as Hamburg would take a 5-0 lead on Star City before the Bulldogs dispatched of the Lions in the later innings.
Monticello would still have some work to do to earn their playoff berth in having to defeat Warren at home or Hamburg on the road in the final game of the season.
Hosting Warren, the Billies would fall behind 1-0 in the first inning before tying the contest in the bottom of the second.
Warren would get two runs in the third with Monticello adding a run in the bottom of the inning with Warren adding three runs in the top of the fourth and would hold the Billies scoreless for the remainder of the contest to take a 6-2 win, putting the Billies playoff hopes in jeopardy.
Traveling to Stuttgart on Friday, April 28, the Billies would need to defeat the conference champs to earn their playoff spot and with Jon Luke Brotherton on the mound the Billies would get a complete game from the starter in a shutout performance allowing three hits and striking out seven as the Billies defeated the Ricebirds 7-0 to punch their ticket to the postseason.
The Billies will travel to DeQueen as the fourth seed from the 4A-8 and will face the one seed, Nashville Scrappers, on Thursday, May 4, at 10 am.
If successful the Billies will return on Friday at 5 pm with a guaranteed game on Saturday at either 12 pm or 2:30 pm.
