The Hoisington Cardinals baseball squad split the season opener against Haven Tuesday at Hoisington.
The Cardinals got their first win in large part due to a strong pitching performance by Jacob Warnken. He had seven strikeouts, five walks, while allowing two earned runs over 6 innings of work. Kody Lang came in in relief to get the final out to record the save.
Kaleb Blazek started the Cardinal offense with a lead-off single in the bottom of the first. Blazek scored on a single by Kody Lang to give the Cardinals an early 1-0 lead. Hoisington scored three runs in the fourth off an error, a sacrifice fly by Braeden Crites, and a single by Hunter Hanzlick.
Haven made a late game push in the seventh inning scoring two runs, but it wasn’t enough as the Cardinals held on to win by a final score of 4-3.
Game two saw Hunter Hanzlick take the mound for the Cardinals. Through four innings of work he recorded four strikeouts and three walks while giving up eight runs on five hits.  Kody Lang came in at the top of the fifth inning in relief. Haven could not get much offense going while Lang was on the hill. Lang allowed two hits, no walks, and three strikeouts, while giving up one earned run.
Kody Lang proved to be an offensive threat as well, getting on base three times, scoring twice, and recording an RBI. He singled in the second and doubled in the third. Hunter Hanzlick had another good game at the plate recording a triple and a double, scoring once.  Also recording hits in the game were Kaleb Blazek, Braeden Crites, Jacob Warnken, and Kyle Lang.
Hoisington took the early lead with a single run in the second inning and added two more in the third. Haven scored three runs in the third. The game was never in doubt after the fourth inning as Haven scored five runs in the fourth and one run in the fifth. The Cardinals scored one run in the fourth and two in the sixth to close the deficit the 9-6 going into the last inning. Haven was able to hold on to get their first win of the season over the Cardinals with a final score of 9-6.