Aviators Fall To Tipp In Extra Innings

VANDALIA — For eight innings, Koby Dues was everything Butler needed him to be.

He struck out nine. He scattered five hits. And he bent without breaking, eating through Tippecanoe's lineup on fumes and pure will deep into a brisk May evening. One earned run in eight innings against a program that annually circles this series on the calendar.

It wasn't enough.

In the end, the Aviators dropped a gut-puncher to the Tippecanoe Red Devils, 5-3, in nine innings Wednesday night - a game that felt, for long stretches, like it was tilting Butler's way.

It just never did.

From the jump, the game seemed to promise something different.

Dues struck out the side with authority to open the top of the first, and the Aviators answered with a two-out rally in the bottom half that had the feel of a statement opening.

Carson Heis laced a hard ground ball to right, scoring two. A Tipp error pushed across a third. Just like that — 3-0 Aviators, and Dues was locked in.

Then Cayden McKinney settled in.

The Red Devils' starter went seven innings, allowing six hits and three runs - all unearned. And after that first inning, Butler simply could not make him pay again.

Runners reached. Opportunities knocked. Nobody answered the door.

Meanwhile, the Red Devils methodically chipped away. A run in the second. One in the third. One more in the fourth, aided by a Butler miscue, and suddenly the three-run cushion had dissolved into a tie game. 3-3.

Seven frames wasn't enough to settle it.

It took one swing in the ninth.

Ethan Harney, Tipp's second baseman, powered a pitch to left field and dropped it in just shy of the of the fence for a double that scored two.

The Aviators would get a shot in the bottom half of the inning, but as it had been most of the evening - the ball seemed to be on a direct line to the Tipp defense.

Ground Out. Ground Out. Line Out.

The kind of ending nobody draws up.

Heis finished 2-for-4 with 2 RBI. Tate Richardson added a double. But for a team that's now 17-3, the offensive blueprint against top arms remains an open question. Three times this season the Aviators have walked off on the wrong side of the scoreboard. Three times they've faced a pitcher who simply wouldn't let them breathe.

The tournament starts in a couple of weeks.

The Aviators have shown they can compete with anybody. Now they must prove they can beat anybody's best.