doenges toyota indians start branson tournament off with two wins; asher hits two home runs
Bartlesville Doenges Toyota Indians pitcher Brenden Asher reacts after as strike out last season. Asher blasted two home runs during action at the Bobcat Showcase Tournament in Branson, Mo.
BECKY BURCH/Bartlesville Area Sports
By Mike Tupa
June 6, 2025
BARTLESVILLE AREA SPORTS REPORT
(Note: You can listen or watch live coverage by Bartlesville Radio of all Indian games. The radio play-by-play broadcasts alternated between KPGM (1500-AM, 99.1-FM) or KWON (1400-AM, 93.3-FM). KWON TV broadcasts are available live or on demand later.)
Brenden Asher proved last spring for Oral Roberts University that he is one of the top up-and-coming pitchers in the Summit League.
On Thursday, Asher proved he can still swing the bat pretty well, too, even though he hasn’t stepped to the plate in approximately a year.
The 2024 Bartlesville High School graduate smashed two homers two help power the Doenges Toyota Indians to two wins in American Legion tournament action in Missouri.
Asher’s two-run blast in the first game put the exclamation point on the 4-0 victory against Springfield (Mo.) Kickapoo, on the Forsyth (Mo.) High School diamond.
In the Indians’ second game Thursday, Asher blasted a solo shot en route to a 12-4 run-rule victory against the boys from Clever, Mo.
The Indians are 2-0 in the Bobcat Showcase Tournament hosted by the College of the Ozarks in Branson, Mo. Bartlesville eyes two games Friday at 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. and one-or-more games on Saturday.
The 15-team event — being played simultaneously at three different fields.
With Thursday’s wins, Bartlesville — which is coached by John Pannell — improved to 3-5 on the season and 3-1 in its last four games.
Following are more details for Thursday’s contests:
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INDIANS 4, KICKAPOO (Mo.) 0
Paul Bunyan, Goliath, Moby Dick, Hulk Hogan, Thor.
All these super-sized warriors couldn’t have delivered a more gigantic effort than Hunter Shea did on the mound.
The Indian hurler overpowered Kickapoo’s offense during the complete-game five-hit shutout he fashioned with catcher Jaxon Zaun.
The Indian offense bolstered him by scratching a run on the board in the first inning. Brett Eaves drew a one-out walk, advanced to third on Asher’s single and bolted home on Sam Marcella’s sacrifice fly.
The Indians doubled their lead to 2-0 in the top of the second after Grant Clark doubled, advanced on Kael Siemers’ hit and scored on Liam Buchanan’s bases-loaded single.
The Indians would score again until the fifth inning, on Asher’s two-run circuit clout, with Liam Buchanan on base. That was the season’s first homer by an Indians’ player.
Meanwhile, Shea cast a colossus shadow on the bump that engulfed the Kickapoo offense.
Shea opened up by striking out Kickapoo’s first batter.
He would close out the win by retiring a string of batters in the final innings.
Several Indians displayed defensive prowess behind Shea, especially Bryce Luelf at second base and Marcella at short.
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INDIANS 12, CLEVER (Mo.) 4
Zaun zapped a three-run double in the first inning to set the tone for Bartlesville in its first run-rule victory of the season.
By the time the first inning closed the Indians led, 7-0, and never looked back.
The Indians started their explosive first with an infield single by Eddie Rice, followed with singles by Eaves and Asher, the latter one driving home Rice. Bartlesville went up 2-0 as a result of a Clever error.
With the bases juiced (Marcella, Shea and Siemers) Zaun belted the bag-clearing double to make it a 5-0 game.
The Indians finished up their first inning uprising with a RBI single by Owen Dum (Siemers scored all the way from second) and a RBI on a ground-out by Luelf.
Asher led off the bottom of the second with a homer to keep the momentum going.
Dum’s sacrifice fly in the third inning plated Siemers to give the Indians a 9-3 advantage.
After a couple of scoreless frames — which Clever crept to within five runs, 9-4 — the Indians put together a three-run rally in the bottom of the sixth, highlighted by Grant Clark’s RBI single.
Lathe Griggs and Zane Stricklin split pitching duties for Bartlesville.
The Indians defense was spot on — including throwing out a couple of would-be run scorers at the plate — one of them with the bases loaded.