OKLAHOMA CITY — Mother Nature had it her way — at least, in the end — but not before a city baseball rivalry had anything to say about it.
Eisenhower coach Jay Vermillion led the charge out of the Eagles' dugout at Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark on Friday night, motioning his players by wheeling his arms to join the grounds crew in covering the large tarp over the infield.
Lawton High players and staff followed suit by sprinting onto the field in unison. In a blink of an eye, the infield was saved from the first band of rain in just in just the nick of time.
Minutes earlier, both teams were warming up on the field while Eisenhower fans posed for group pictures near the team dugout. All seemed well with only 20 minutes before the originally scheduled first pitch.
But at 6:43 p.m., the heavens opened up and unleashed a heavy, yet brief spurt of rain which soaked the field.
It sent the fans who were taking pictures frantically up the stands and into the sheltered overhang area of the concourse. It sent the Ike and LHS players back into their rain-soaked dugouts to anxiously wait out the first rain delay of the evening.
It didn't send the two squads home packing, though. The Eagles and Wolverines were here to play -- no matter how long it took. The first rain spurt passed and players took the field again, this time to the green grass in the outfield to finish warming up.
Exactly one hour later, at 7:43 p.m., the next band of rain swooped in from the west, this time bringing torrential rain for a good 15 minutes. Just like that, it was back to the waiting game for fans and players. Finally, a half hour later at 8:13 p.m., the rain was out of sight and the grounds crew began rolling up the tarp signaling it was time for play ball.
Rain put a damper on the city rivalry game in Bricktown, but it didn't put out the fire both Ike and LHS played with on the big stage.
"Oh they loved it," Ike coach Jay Vermillion said. "They were fired up, and it was exciting for them. It's a bummer they couldn't finish the game in this park."
Ike raced out to a 5-0 start after the first inning before LHS stormed back to take the lead by scoring eight runs in the next two innings. The Wolverines' skipper Kyle Fultz attributed his team's persistence after an early gut punch to the atmosphere of a Triple-A ballpark.
"They fed off the environment big time," Fultz said. "I've never seen us play that well. Guys that hadn't been playing well played out of their mind. Everybody stepped up. When you're playing Eisenhower it's a big game. Now we're playing in Bricktown -- it's even bigger."
Despite the showers shoving back the game's start, a certain buzz was in the air and the players amplified it.
Ike's Alex Young, who drove in three runs off his first inning double and tossed three innings on the mound, had little trouble finding motivation under the bright lights of Bricktown.
"It made a big difference. I enjoyed playing in the big stadium," Young said. "It definitely made me play a lot harder for my team."
Ike and LHS fought back-and-forth throughout a game that was drawn out due to a multitude of baserunners. Only four innings had passed as the game eclipsed the two-hour mark since the delayed first pitch.
The Eagles and Wolverines didn't know it at the time, but the game's pace would re-open the door for Mother Nature to crash the party.
Lawton High tied the game at nine apiece in the top of the sixth inning seconds before the rain made yet another encore -- this time packing a punch.
The low-pressure system's center circulation -- which was fueling severe thunderstorms to the north in Kansas and to the east over towards Tulsa and into Arkansas and Missouri -- began unleashing its spiral rain bands, engulfing Oklahoma City.
Knowing full-well the rain would last at least for another hour, if not more, the Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark staff met with the umpires briefly before deciding to call the game at 10:54 p.m.
Mother Nature may have gotten the last laugh on Friday night, but it didn't steal the show Eisenhower and Lawton High put on for five innings.
"It's happened before, getting rained out," Young said. "It sucks, but it's just part of the game."
