Baseball Game Preview: Carroll Cougars vs. Clinton Prairie Gophers

Carroll is 8-2 against Clinton Prairie since May of 2018 and they'll have a chance to extend that dominance on Wednesday. The Cougars will host the Gophers at 5:30 p.m. The two teams are strolling into their matchups after big wins in their previous games.

Carroll is headed in fresh off scoring the most runs they have all season. They blew past Taylor 17-7 on Tuesday. The high-flying hitting performance was a huge turnaround for the Cougars considering their two-run performance the game before.

Landon Hammond

Runs (Career)

04/29/25 @ Taylor	2
04/11/25 vs Wabash	1
04/08/25 vs Winamac	1
05/13/24 @ Sheridan	1
05/03/24 @ Taylor	1

Landon Hammond was a standout: he went 2-for-3 with two stolen bases, two runs, and one double. Those two runs gave him a new career-high. Another player making a difference was Coy Lytle, who went 3-for-4 with one triple, one run, and one RBI.

Carroll was getting hits left and right and finished the game having posted a batting average of .412. That's the best batting average they've posted all season.

While Clinton Prairie didn't have the best season last year (they finished 11-14), it's starting to look like those struggles are a thing of the past. Everything went their way against Western Boone on Monday as they made off with a 12-1 victory. The Gophers might be getting used to big wins seeing as the team has won four contests by ten runs or more this season.

Clinton Prairie saw seven different players step up and record at least one hit. One of them was Kye Jacobs, who went a perfect 3-for-3 with one home run, five RBI, and two runs. Jacobs is becoming a predictor of the Gophers' success: when he posts at least two runs the team is undefeated (and 2-3 when he doesn't). Wyatt Harshbarger was another, going 1-for-2 with two runs and one RBI.

Clinton Prairie's win was their eighth straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 6-3. Those home victories came thanks in part to their pitching effort, having only surrendered 1.9 runs on average over those games. As for Carroll, their win ended a seven-game drought on the road dating back to last season and puts them at 3-9.