Night of Nostalgia at Brent Gould

From the ESPN cameras on opening night, to Bob Cerv Night, to Tanner Rindels game winning hit on the 4th of July, to a night of nostalgia with Fairbanks in town, it was a memorable summer of baseball at Brent Gould Field this summer. Liberal beat the Midnight Sun Goldpanners 8-4 in front of a near capacity crowd at Brent Gould Field Tuesday night. But the big story was the two program’s meeting in Liberal for the first time since 1975. Longtime Fairbanks general manager Don Dennis and long time manager Jim Dietz have been touring the mountain and midwest states with this team since July 5. The Goldpanners won two NBC titles at Liberal’s expense in 1973 and 1980.

Before the game Matt Friedrich was named the BJ Director of the Year and Oklahoma State’s Brett Davis was named the BJ player of the year. Friedrich just spent his first year on the board. Davis is 4-1 on the mound for Liberal.

BJ manager Mike Hargrove spoke to the crowd. “During the two years Sharon and I have been in Liberal, the people we’ve met around town and the players are all good people,” Hargrove said. “We want to thank you and the ball players for coming out and listening to coach (John) Martin, coach (Galen) McSpadden, and I this summer in hot weather screaming and hollering at them and kick them in the butt and hear the players say yes sir, yes sir, I will and they have every day. You’ve got a good thing here and need to keep it going.”

Liberal won the game 8-4 after a strong start scoring five in the first. Cal State LA’s Camron Collard pitched seven innings without allowing an earned run. Louisiana Tech’s Alex Williams was 5-5 with a double and an RBI. Wichita State’s Mitch Caster added two hits and an RBI. Liberal is 27-18 and will play at Dodge City Wednesday night at 7:00 PM on Talkradio 1270 and kscb.net.