Sweet Home Southern: Clark, Lazo look back on time playing MSSU baseball
· Yahoo Sports
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CLAREMORE, Okla. — Bryce Darnell’s baseball team concluded its season over the weekend as Missouri Southern State University fell to Rogers State University in the NCAA Division II Central Region tournament.
MSSU came up short in two tightly contested games with the region’s No. 2 seed in Rogers State.
The 3-1 loss Saturday was just a few feet away from potentially being a 4-3 walk-off victory.
The Lions’ Ethan Clark struck a ball to deep left field. The ball was never very high in the air, and the strong winds were able to cut it down and allow Luis Fuentes to catch the ball right in front of the wall.
That was Clark’s last swing as a Lion as he graduates this spring. Things may not have ended how he would have liked, but it doesn’t change anything about the experience he had in Joplin.
“I showed up on campus when I was 18 — didn’t know if I’d like it. There was a point I almost went home at semester my freshman year and didn’t play baseball. Now Joplin’s my home. I played here for four years,” Clark said. “Best years of my life, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world.”
The 6-foot-2, 165-pound, designated hitter/outfielder talked about some of those feelings he had when he was considering going home during winter break of his freshman year. He believed that he was undersized compared with his teammates as he watched them hit home runs while he was sometimes “barely hitting it out of the infield.”
He said there were some difficult times as he wondered if he belonged there, but ultimately he chose to stay.
“I decided to stick it out, and I made great friends, I met the love of my life, I built family in Joplin … I grinded through it, and I’m so glad I did,” Clark said.
Clark’s personal experience is one of overcoming and getting more than expected by fighting through the difficult moments. That resembles the story of the 2026 team that started the season 8-10 and was just 1-5 in the MIAA to start conference play.
Darnell spoke about his team and what they were able to accomplish this season by reaching the sixth NCAA regional in his 19 years as head coach.
The Lions were able to finish tied for second in the MIAA with Rogers State with a 26-10 record and just one game behind the conference leaders, Pittsburg State University.
“I’m proud of our team and after the way we started, we were able to galvanize. … It’s pretty remarkable based on our start,” Darnell said. “After the first two weeks we played really well. Credit to our guys.”
“We didn’t know if we were going to make the conference tournament. We were worried about being in the top 10 teams,” Clark added. “We started playing the way we should be playing.”
The experience Clark had that he believed was life-changing isn’t just his. Among the five seniors, Jason Lazo also expressed some sentiment for having played at MSSU.
“Wouldn’t want to be anywhere else, honestly. I had fun with these guys. Wouldn’t have chose anywhere else, honestly. This is my family forever,” Lazo said.
‘Really, really good team’
Rogers State head coach Chris Klimas spoke to having to face MSSU five times this season and gave his thoughts on it.
“It’s kind of stupid that you play somebody that many times between regular season and postseason,” Klimas said. “I really respect the job that those guys do. … That’s a really, really good team Missouri Southern’s got.”
With the way the Division II tournament works, teams are put in regions based on location and not where they’re ranked like Division I. Klimas’ team also had to face the University of Central Missouri a fifth time. The Hillcats lost to UCM in the regional championship as well.
When it comes to the series with the seventh-seeded Lions, Klimas doesn’t think the seeds mattered a whole lot. Rogers State won four of five games against MSSU, but three of those were decided by just four runs. Rogers State won 4-3, 8-7 and 3-1 in those games. Then Rogers State won 9-1 and MSSU won 9-3. All five games were played in Claremore.
“I think it was two evenly matched teams,” Klimas said.
All-region
MSSU’s Brayden Luikart was named first-team all-region for the Central Region by the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association, while teammates Owen Schneider and Will Doherty earned second-team honors.