Jamestown Post 14 Eagles fall 6-5 against Minot at home

JAMESTOWN — The Jamestown Post 14 Eagles’ defense came back to hurt them in a 6-5 loss to the Minot Vistas on Wednesday, July 9, at Jack Brown Stadium.

The Eagles had seven errors and gave up two unearned runs in the loss. On the other side, the Vistas had three errors and gave up three earned runs.

Both teams had early chances to break the deadlock, but the Vistas (20-11) were the first ones to take advantage of their opportunity when Kellan Burke hit a single to right to score the runner from second and push his team in front 1-0. The Eagles responded in the bottom of the third with three runs on two hits and two errors to take a 3-1 lead.

The Vistas had a chance to respond in the top of the fourth when they loaded the bases with only one out but a double play ended the threat and gave the Eagles (10-21) an emotional jump.

“When you can have good defense like that and turn a double play, that just rolls right into the next inning and rolls into our hitting,” Eagles head coach Sam Joseph said. “That’s awesome that we can do that. Mason and Hudson did a great job up the middle today.”

The Eagles’ Nolan Maulding hit a moonshot over the wall in right to push the lead out to 4-1. The Vistas got one back in the top of the fifth when Braden Nelson reached on an error allowing a run to score and trimming the deficit to 4-2.

“He has no fear. There’s no fear,” Joseph said. “That kid wants to come here and he wants to play baseball and that’s what you get from Nolan, you get intensity, you get energy and those are the results when all of that is combined into a player. He has no fear, he comes out here and he runs around, he tries to ring people up and when he’s in there he doesn’t get cheated which is what we want. As soon as that ball left his bat that was a no-doubter, I didn’t even watch it. I just waited for him to come and slap my hand, give a high five.”

Nolan Maulding collects some high fives from teammates after scoring a single homer against Minot on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, at Jack Brown Stadium.

John M. Steiner / The Jamestown Sun

The Vistas got one back in the seventh to bring their deficit to within one at 4-3 two hits and two errors. The Vistas would not stop pushing and tied the game up at four on a passed ball before they took the lead with two more runs at 6-4 in the top of the ninth. The Eagles would not quit, though and got one back in the bottom of the ninth on a Zander Wolsky single to make it a one-run game.

“When you don’t get out of it one, two, three, it’s always frustrating,” Joseph said. You have to tip your hat to them they put the ball in play and they forced us to play defense and obviously we didn’t play defense good enough to win that game.”

Nolan Maulding follows through on a hit and watches the ball fly over the fence for a single homerun against Minot on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, at Jack Brown Stadium.

John M. Steiner / The Jamestown Sun

The Eagles used three pitchers in the game, Kale Verke, Cody Busch and Zach Gaiser with the trio combining to go all nine innings giving up four earned runs on 11 hits while striking out four hitters and walking three. The Vistas used four pitchers, Nick Thomas, Mason Stewart, Kellan Burke and Tre Stewart

With a Minot player leeding off third base, Jamestown's Kale Verke delivers a pitch on Wednesday, July 9, 2025, at Jack Brown Stadium.

John M. Steiner / The Jamestown Sun

The Eagles are back in action at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, July 10, when they take on the Grand Forks Post 6 Royals.

P26 6, P14 5

P26: 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 3–6 11 3

P14: 0 0 3 1 0 0 0 0 1–5 5 7

WP: Kellan Burke, LP: Zach Gaiser (0-1)

Hello,
My name is Max O'Neill. I am a Sports Reporter at The Jamestown Sun. I am a native New Yorker, who graduated from Ithaca College in 2020 with a degree in Television-Radio.