Delgado Community College’s run to a Division I Junior College World Series ended in two in Grand Junction Colo. with an 8-6 loss to Chattahoochee Valley and then a 9-5 setback to Cochise College.
The Dolphins got down 3-0 in first inning of their opener Saturday before tying things on Jordan Caillouet’s three-run homer in the second.
The teams traded runs over the next five innings, leaving it tied 4-4 through seven. Delgado scored two in the top of the eighth to go up 6-4, but Chattahoochee Valley put up four in the eighth to capture the 8-6 win.
The second game saw the Dolphins trail 3-1 through three. Each club scored a run in the fifth, but Cochise scored five of the next six runs and led 9-3 after seven. Delgado scored twice in the ninth, but came up short in the 9-5 loss.
It was the third JUCO team 2011 Franklinton High graduate Clay Tageant has been on. His first two were when he was at LSU Eunice the year he was redshirted and then as a redshirt freshman.
Tageant, who had warmed up Saturday, but never got in, took the mound in the JUCO World Series for the first time in Sunday’s setback.
Tageant worked two-thirds of an inning, allowing no runs on two hits with a strikeout and a walk.
“When I came in to pitch, there was adrenaline there, but we were down a good bit,” Tageant said. “It was kind of get us out of this inning and let us hit. I wasn’t really nervous. I faced a lefty. He had had trouble with sliders, so I threw a couple at his back foot and struck him out. That felt good.”
Tageant finished this season with a 6-0 record and a 5.38 earned run average over 30.1 innings.
Delgado finishes the 2014 campaign with a 43-13 record. Despite the results in the World Series, Tageant said it was a great experience.
“Transferring to Delgado was the best decision of my life and the most success I’ve had in college,” Tageant said. “We had fun. Coach Joe (Scheuermann) is an awesome guy to play for. It really feels like you’re going to war with somebody. He’s the general and he’s got your back. When we walked into tough places to play, we were going in there to win and we knew we were going to win. We had a really tight group of friends and everybody had the same mindset. Let’s get to the regionals, let’s get to the World Series and make some noise. It didn’t end the way we wanted, but it was a good year overall. It was the third time Delgado has gone to the World Series.”
Tageant said being at the World Series made you feel like a big leaguer. He said that when he was in the bullpen, children would come up and ask for his autograph.
“It was pretty cool,” Tageant said. “It made you feel like a big leaguer. I gave out hundreds and hundreds of autographs. It gives you the feeling of kids looking up to you. We had a host family and they were awesome. The people at the World Series took a picture of you and made baseball cards of you. Everything about it was awesome. I missed the food from Louisiana. The food wasn’t bad there, but it wasn’t Louisiana food. We were on the big stage. We had about 8,000 people at the games. It was an awesome atmosphere. We got to listen to (former Major League manager) Tony LaRussa (who is entering the MLB Hall of Fame this year) speak at the banquet. It was my first D-I Junior college World Series experience. I wish the games would’ve gone differently, but it was still a great experience.”
Tageant was also strong in the classroom. He graduated from Delgado this semester and earned a 4.0 GPA for the third consecutive semester.