The Starbuck Stars ended the regular-season with a 7-7 record after losing a 5-3, 15-inning game at home to Atwater Sunday afternoon.  The Stars, who also fell to NLS, Friday, June 30 (4-3), finished 4-6 in the County Line League while Atwater earned the regular-season title and NLS finished second.

The Stars will open up the County Line playoffs at 1:30 p.m., Saturday at fourth-seeded Norway Lake-Sunburg.  If the Stars had beaten Atwater, they would have earned the third seed and a first-round game at home.

Instead, the Stars were seeded fifth and will open up the postseason on the road.  The County Line Tourney continues Sunday and the weekends of July 22-23 and July 29-30.

NLS 6, Starbuck 3

Starbuck lost a close game at home against New London-Spicer last Friday night, 6-3.  Starbuck led 1-0 through two innings, but NLS went up for good with a three-run third inning.

The Twins added single runs in the seventh, eighth and ninth innings to up its lead to 6-2 before Starbuck scored one run in its final at-bat.

Darion Alexander dropped to 3-2 for the season with the loss on the mound.  He gave up three hits, five walks and three runs over six innings with six strikeouts before giving way to Mitchell Gruber, who gave up five hits and three runs in the final three innings.

Austin Ver Steeg went 3-for-5 with a triple and run scored and Austin Friese was also 3-for-5 with a double and three RBI to lead the Starbuck offense.

Also registering hits were Matt Gruber, Aaron Ver Steeg, Andrew Toop and Torii Johnson.

In the ninth inning, Darion Alexander led off with a walk and went to second on a one-out single by Austin Ver Steeg.  Alexander came home on a single by Friese, but Ver Steeg and Friese were stranded at first and second as NLS got the final two outs on a lineout to left and a strikeout.

Atwater 5, Stars 3

The Stars lost the regular-season finale to Atwater, Sunday, 5-3 in 15 innings.  Atwater tied the game up at 3-3 with a run in the seventh and then got the gamewinning hit by David Kingery with two outs in the top-half of the 15th inning.

Atwater, which outhit the Stars 13-6, scored it first run in the opening inning, but Starbuck took a short-lived 2-1 lead with two runs in the second.

Starbuck scored both of its runs in the second on an error with the bases loaded while also registering two of its six hits for the game.  Starbuck’s best chance at additional runs came in the sixth inning when Andrew Toop led off with a double and Torii Johnson followed with a single and both runners advanced on a stolen base only to have Atwater get out of the inning with three-straight outs.

Johnson ended 2-for-7 for the Stars with two runs scored, while Darion Alexander had a hit, three walks and two stolen bases, and Matt Gruber, Austin Ver Steeg and Andrew Toop also had hits for the Stars.

Austin Ver Steeg started on the mound for the Stars before giving way to Darion Alexander and Mitchell Gruber, who eventually was credited with the loss.

NLS 6, at Stars 3

NLS 0 0 3 0 0 0 1 1 1 — 6 8 3

Stars (7-6) 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 — 3 10 0

HITTING:  STARS-Austin Ver Steeg 3-for-5, 1 run, triple; Austin Friese 3-for-5, 3 RBI, double; Matt Gruber 1-for-5, 1 run; Aaron Ver Steeg 1-for-5; Andrew Toop 1-for-3; Torii Johnson 1-for-4; Darion Alexander 0-for-3, 1 run, bb, sacrifice; Mitchell Gruber 0-for-2, 2 bb, sb   . . . NLS-Cayden Hanson 3-for-5, 2 runs, double

PITCHING:  (ip-h-r-er-bb-so):  STARS-Darion Alexander (L, 3-2)  6-3-3-3-5-6; Mitchell Gruber 3-5-3-3-1-0 . . . NLS-Hunter Magnuson (W)  6-7-2-1-2-7; Ben Kulset 3-3-1-1-1-1

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Atwater 5, at Stars 3

Atwater 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 — 5 13 4

Stars 0 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 — 3 6 3

HITTING:  STARS-Torii Johnson 2-for-7, 2 runs; Darion Alexander 1-for-3, 3 bb, 2 sb; Matt Gruber 1-for-7, RBI; Austin Ver Steeg 1-for-6, bb, double; Andrew Toop 1-for-5, 1 run, bb, double, hbp   . ATW-Kobe Holtz 3-for-7, 2 RBI

PITCHING:  STARS-Austin Ver Steeg 2-2-1-1-2-2; Darion Alexander 7-6-2-1-5-8; Mitchell Gruber (L, 0-1)  6-5-2-2-4-5 . . . ATW-David Kingery 5-3-3-0-3-5; Chris Fellows 5-2-0-0-3-4; Hayden Straumann 1-1-0-0-0-0; Kobe Holtz 3-0-0-0-1-3; Jack Peterson (W)  1-0-0-0-1-1

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