PUEBLO – In its semifinal win against Resurrection Christian yesterday, Custer County’s Rusty Caldwell had a pedestrian game, 1-for-2 with an RBI and a sacrifice.

He did a little bit better in the championship game.

Caldwell went 4-for-5 with 6 RBI and scored four times helping Custer County to its second state championship in eight years beating Jefferson Academy 16-7 at the Runyon Sports Complex.

Custer County started the season at 2-6 but since had won 15 straight and Caldwell feels playing teams in higher classifications early on helped in the long run.

“We started off slow, but we were playing bigger teams than we were,” Caldwell said. “I think that’s what helped get us here was playing teams that we had to work at to beat.”

One of Caldwell four hits was a two-run home run in the fourth inning, his first of the season. He admitted going into the game that he wasn’t even pondering the idea of getting a home run in the state title game.

“I came into the game not thinking about hitting any home runs and I did,” Caldwell who was named the Rocky Mountain News’ player of the tournament, said. “I wasn’t even thinking about getting base hits I just went up there and hit, didn’t matter where it went or what it did I was just happy to be up there.”

The offense came alive in the two games against Resurrection Christian and Jefferson Academy, scoring 26 runs on 26 hits, something that Kyle Lewsader contributes to lots of work in the batting cages.

“It’s getting our work in as (coach) Steve (Schultz) would say,” Lewsader said. “We have an inside batting cage for when the weather is bad we go in there and take a lot of hacks hitting practice golf balls, it’s a great way of seeing the ball so we can drive it real hard.”

Lewsader finished 3-for-5 scoring once and driving in two runs.

The turning point in the game came in the second inning when the Bobcats (17-6) scored nine runs on six hits, one of those was a two-run home run by Jeb Stoltzfus, but also was the beneficiary of three Jefferson Academy (11-12) errors, a walk and a hit bats man.

Jaguars’ Xavier Lewis said that inning took a shot at the team’s confidence but they fought through that and kept playing on.

“That was huge,” Lewis said. “That tried to bring us down a bit but we just needed to keep our heads up and push through and I think that we did that and I’m proud of the guys.”

Jefferson Academy got its bats going late in the game; scoring five runs in the final four innings, but by then the damage was already done.

“I was proud of everyone for doing that and fighting back,” Jefferson Academy’s Joey Younkerman said. “That was all that we could have asked for.”

Custer County – 091 210 3 –16 14 4

Jefferson Academy – 100 312 0 – 7 12 5

CC (ab-r-h-rbi) – Ben Mullett ss 5-2-1-0, Aaron Mullett dh 4-2-1-0, Kyle Hershberger 2b 5-1-1-0, Freddie White 1b 2-1-0-0, Corey Barnes p 2-2-1-0, Rusty Caldwell lf 5-4-4-6, Jeb Stoltzfus rf 5-2-2-4, Jason Frink 3b 2-1-1-0, Kyle Lewsader cf 5-1-3-2, Tyler Stoltzfus c 0-0-0-0, James Dunlap cr 0-0-0-0, John Barrett cr 0-0-0-0. Pitching (ip-h-r-er-bb-so) Barnes (W) 5.2-10-7-5-2-9, B. Mullett 1.1-2-0-0-1-3.

JA- Xavier Lewis cf 5-1-1-1, Tommy Staudt ss 3-2-1-0, Joey Younkerman 1b 3-1-1-0, Christian Naylor p/3b 4-0-3-1, Zach Coisman 3b/rf 3-1-1-1, Bryant Anderson 2b 3-1-1-0, Chris Johnson c 3-0-0-0, Fletcher Johnson dh 4-1-1-1, Danny Williams lf 4-0-3-0, Mike Ferrero rf 0-0-0-0, Ben Taylor p 0-0-0-0, Christian Oleson p 0-0-0-0. Pitching: Naylor (L) 1.1-6-9-3-1-0, Taylor 1.2-2-3-2-1-0, Oleson 3-3-1-1-3-2, Coisman 1-3-3-3-3-0.

E- Hershberger (2), Barnes, Caldwell, Naylor (2), Staudt (2), Coisman. 2B- Barnes, Hersherberger. 3B- Lewsader, A. Mullett. HR- J. Stoltzfus, Caldwell. HBP- Frink, Anderson. SB- Lewsader (2), B. Mullett (2), A. Mullett, Frink, Barnes, White, Anderson, Lewis. CS- Dunlap. SAC- A. Mullett, Coisman.