Rooke Dedicates Performance to Friend

Thomas Rooke knows that life is full of struggles. He is going to be challenged, and he understands that.

This past week has proven it.

But the junior left-hander has baseball. He has his team, and on May 14, as the Wildcats faced in-state rival Kansas — the
first game after he lost one of his best friends — his team needed him.

So after being called upon from the bullpen, Rooke paused, stepped off the mound and took a moment to focus on the game and reflect on the events of the previous three days.

'"Shaun this one is for you,'" Rooke thought to himself. '"You're with me, I know you are.'"

To Rooke, the game that night in Lawrence against the Jayhawks was for his best friend — the friend he shared the game of baseball with since playing on the same Little League All-Star team nine years ago.

The two represented their hometown of Spring, Texas. Now Rooke was representing Shaun Finley's life through this single pitching performance.

Just two days earlier, Rooke awoke to a voicemail from his mother Eleanor. She was crying during the quick message, and she told Thomas to call back immediately.

Eleanor had been home preparing to go to work when she saw news reports about a serious car wreck on nearby Interstate 45 in Texas. Shortly after, she noticed several missed phone calls from Finley's mother.

"At that that point, I was thinking 'Oh God, I hope that wasn't Shaun,'" Eleanor said. "Unfortunately, it was."

According to reports, Finley's car was traveling at high speeds on the interstate when it left the road, and flew through the roof of a local personal training gym.

She immediately called Thomas and left him the voicemail he would wake up to.

Thomas called his mother back after and Eleanor told him the news. Shaun had died in a car wreck.

"It hit me like a ton of bricks." Rooke said. "I remember thinking, 'I want to go home,' I wanted to talk to everybody."

But he couldn't.

His team was in the midst of a tight race for second place in the Big 12 with just two series remaining on its schedule. The first of those two series began in just two days against KU in Lawrence, and that's when he knew what he had to do.

"I dedicated the next game I pitched to him," Thomas said. "I knew he wanted to be out there with us, he was my best friend and I kind of felt like I needed to."

He followed through on his dedication.

Thomas threw two innings of pivotal relief work, silencing the Jayhawks' offense, and allowing the Wildcats to complete a comeback. Thomas was credited with the win — his third this season — and the Wildcats were able to return to Manhattan in position to take the series, which they did on Sunday.

"I kind of took it to heart," Rooke said. "I thought about how I know he wished he could be there watching me, and I know he was. I kind of took that to heart, and kind of put that into my game and I feel like, not that he led us to victory, but he was there in the victory."

It was a performance that didn't surprise K-State coach Brad Hill.

"Sometimes as a coach you get caught up in the heat of the game and you don't even think about what is taking place in a young man and his life," Hill said. "I know it couldn't have been easy for him during the weekend against KU — that was a very admirable job — what a courageous thing for him to go in there and just be there for us."

Thomas learned before the series against KU that Shaun's funeral was going to be on Saturday. Due to his baseball and school schedule, he was forced to miss the service, which spurred his decision to dedicate Friday's game in his memory.

"I realized that Shaun would want me to play," Thomas said. "He wouldn't want me to leave the team just for his sake, and I took that to heart."

The Wildcats now have one series remaining on their schedule as they travel to College Station, Texas this weekend to face the Texas A&M Aggies.

College Station is just 80 miles north of Rooke's hometown.

The series has given friends of Shaun, the community of Spring, and Thomas an opportunity to celebrate Shaun's life through
baseball.

Rooke's father, Charlie, said Thomas' grandparents, aunt and uncle and many friends from Oak Ridge High School plan to travel to College Station for the series.

Shaun's mother, Barbra, will also be in attendance.

"I am glad it's the last games of the season here," Charlie said. "Once he sees some of these people, I can just imagine."

Charlie and Eleanor, who both graduated from Texas A&M, said they have been preparing to see their son, understanding it will be an emotional time. They haven't seen him since April 16 when they traveled to Manhattan for the Baylor series.

"I know, come this weekend, I told Barbra we don't want him (Thomas) to see her until after the game," Eleanor said. "It is going to be emotional for all of us, and it's going to be hard on him especially."

But while Rooke knows this weekend will be tough, he said he knows Shaun will be there with him on the mound, watching him play the game they shared for so long together.

"I understand that I am going to go through struggles," he said. "But I know he is there with me and that is kind of how I portray it. I tell myself he is with me."

- Photo K-State Sports Information

Martini, Cats Save Sunflower Series

Kansas State couldn't have asked for a better position to be in during the sixth inning of Sunday's Sunflower Showdown finale at Tointon Family Stadium.

With the game tied, bases loaded and perhaps their most reliable hitter stepped to the plate, the Wildcats could taste their first lead of the day.

K-State badly needed a win on Sunday to win its first Big 12 series in three weeks, and Nick Martini was right there to give it to the Cats.

After driving a 3-1 pitch through the right side of the infield, bringing in two runs, the sophomore center fielder delivered on the opportunity.The two-run single gave the Wildcats their first lead, and it proved to be enough as they cruised through the final three innings behind a stellar bullpen effort for the 8-5 win in their final regular season home game.

"That's definitely huge for us," Martini said of the series win. "It gets us going in the right direction heading down to (Texas) A&M. Hopefully we can do good things down there too."

With the victory the Wildcats (34-16 13-10 Big 12) won the Sunflower Showdown series 2-1, after taking Friday's game 5-4 in Lawrence.

"It's been three weeks," KSU coach Brad Hill said. "It's been a long time coming since we have had a series win, and we have talked about that. Gosh it's been three weeks. You win on Friday and it's like, 'Come on let's go get this thing done.' I'm glad we did today — that's all I can say."

The series win kept the Wildcats in contention for a possible second-place finish in the Big 12, as they are in a close race with Oklahoma, Texas Tech and Texas A&M. Each team is within two games of each other, with K-State holding a half-game advantage over OU heading into the final weekend of play.

"I know it's a close race for second place," senior Adam Muenster said. "We definitely want second place, it's something that has never happened here before."

The Kansas bats got hot early, as leadoff hitter Brandon Macias began the game with a solo home run to left field off Wildcat starter Justin Lindsey. It was the beginning of a tough outing for the sophomore right-hander. Lindsey worked through 2 2/3 innings, giving up three runs on seven hits.

"Obviously, I had a rough start out there," Lindsey said. "The good thing about our team is we have a very good bullpen. Coach saw that I didn't have the stuff that I had against Texas or Baylor earlier in the year, so we just went to the hot hand right away. We have one of the best bullpens in the nation, so it's real nice to know that if you don't have it today the guy behind you is going to have it."

The K-State offense seemed to suffer an early hangover from its 7-3 loss on Saturday, prompting hitting coach Andy Sawyers to use an in-game pep-talk to motivate the squad.

"We actually came out kind of sluggish during those first three innings," Muenster said. "It actually took coach screaming at us to get us going."

The Wildcats responded, scoring three runs in the fourth inning and took advantage of a throwing error by KU starting pitcher Tanner Poppe to tie the game at three.

After the sluggish start, the K-State bullpen, or "Shark Tank" as they have called themselves, kept the Wildcats in the ballgame, allowing just one earned run over 6 1/3 innings of work. The combination of Thomas Rooke, Evan Marshall and James Allen combined to give up just four hits.

Marshall had an impressive outing, going 3 2/3 innings, allowing just one KU hit.

"Evan has just been incredible out of the bullpen for us," Hill said. "Anytime we feel like we can get to that sixth inning and we are tied or ahead, or just close, you feel really good about him coming in and stopping them.

Evan right now has just been our go-to guy. He has been outstanding."

The Wildcats have the week off before returning to action on Friday as they travel to College Station, Texas to face Texas A&M in their final Big 12 regular season series. First pitch on Friday is scheduled for 6:35 p.m.

Texas Tops Cats, Takes Series

Kansas State played just the way it wanted to on Sunday afternoon.

Two days earlier, after a one-run victory over top-ranked Texas to open the series, KSU relief pitcher Evan Marshall described his team as "brave."

In the series finale on Sunday, that's exactly the way the Wildcats played again.

Only this time, it wasn't enough for the victory, as 20th-ranked K-State fell to the Longhorns, 6-5, at Tointon Family Stadium.

After watching the Longhorns blast three solo home runs in the first inning, KSU starting pitcher Justin Lindsey and the Wildcats could have easily folded. Some teams might have.

Instead, K-State rallied and put itself nine outs away from beating the Longhorns for a second time in three days.

But a culmination of mistakes in the final three innings doomed the Cats and proved too costly to overcome.

"I thought the kids fought really hard today," head coach Brad Hill said. "They fought hard and competed. We just came up a little short."

That fight in the Wildcats (32-15, 11-9) came after Lindsey was able to overcome an adversity-filled first inning where he gave up three homers to the first five batters he faced.

Lindsey suddenly locked in, though, after striking out Longhorn catcher Cameron Rupp to end the potentially disastrous inning.

He didn't allow a hit for the next three innings, which allowed the Wildcats to rally and get back into the game. He pitched 5 1/3 innings and struck out a career-high nine batters on the day.

"My hats off to (Lindsey)," Texas head coach Augie Garrido said. "He gave up three home runs and he never flinched. He kept coming after them, hit the mitt and never showed any fear of anybody, and I thought that's what kept them in the game."

K-State began to make noise in the third inning, but failed to capitalize on a bases-loaded situation. But in the fourth inning, the Wildcats finally broke through.

With two runners in scoring position, Tanner Witt singled up the middle, bringing home Blair DeBord and Mike Kindel to tie the game at three.

Junior Carter Jurica followed with a sacrifice single and Nick Martini singled, giving the Wildcats a 5-3 lead.

"I thought it was good, especially after yesterday's loss," Jurica said of the comeback. "We didn't compete very well at the plate and today we did a better job of that."

But Texas (41-8, 21-3) responded quickly. The Longhorns closed the K-State lead to 5-4 in the sixth on a solo home run by
Kevin Keyes, his second of the day. Keyes finished the game going 3-for-3 with 4 RBIs.

In the seventh, the Wildcats fell victim to two errors, allowing Texas to jump ahead again. Texas' Jordan Etier reached on an error by Jurica at shortstop to open the inning, and Cohl Walla reached base after Jurica dropped a throw to second from
Marshall.

Brandon Loy laid a sac bunt down the third-base line, and Tant Shepherd lined out to second base, setting up a decision made by Hill to intentionally walk Russell Moldenhauer to face Keyes with the bases loaded and two outs.

"I tell you what, he (Keyes) likes that situation," Hill said. "He took it really personal when we walked Moldenhauer in front of him. At the same time Moldenhauer has owned us for four years here and I like the right-on-right matchup with the force out at first base."

As he did all series though, Keyes delivered, driving in two runs and giving Texas the lead.

"We got in a bad position there too, with the couple of errors," Hill said. "That's the number one team in the nation. You give (them) a couple of errors in one inning and they are going to capitalize on it and they did."

The Wildcats will have the week off before returning to action on Friday when they take on in-state rival Kansas. The first game of the series is in Lawrence, scheduled for 7 p.m., before returning to Manhattan for the second and third games of the Sunflower Showdown series.

-Photo Manhattan Mercury