PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE - GMG senior Zach Duncan, left, and junior Kaleb Gill celebrate after the Wolverines recorded the final out of their 7-2 victory over Gladbrook-Reinbeck in Wednesday’s Class 1A District 7 baseball semifinal at Koch Memorial Field in Reinbeck. Duncan pitched 5 2/3 innings for the win, advancing GMG to Saturday’s district finals.

REINBECK — The GMG baseball team pulled an improbable amount of optimism out of a 12-2 loss to Gladbrook-Reinbeck nearly two months earlier.

The Wolverines backed up their beliefs by beating the Rebels when it mattered the most.

Zach Duncan and Braden Duden combined to pitch a five-hitter and the GMG defense played error-free as the sixth-seeded Wolverines knocked off the No. 2 Rebels 7-2 in Wednesday’s Class 1A District 7 semifinals at Koch Memorial Field.

GMG (10-14) capitalized on a pair of early errors by Gladbrook-Reinbeck and stunned the Rebels (25-12) in a 50-day-old rematch. G-R beat the Wolverines 12-2 on May 16 on the same diamond, but it was a 3-2 ballgame until a bevy of walks helped the Rebels erupt for nine runs in the fifth and final inning.

In Wednesday’s contest, Duncan and Duden issued just four walks while striking out three. The rest was up to the Wolverines’ defense, and the challenge was met head-on.

PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE - Gladbrook-Reinbeck catcher William Kiburis, left, makes the tag on GMG’s Noah Teske on a play at the plate in the fifth inning of Wednesday’s Class 1A District 7 baseball semifinal in Reinbeck. Teske was out on the play, but the Wolverines defeated the Rebels 7-2.

“We’ve had troubles with walks but I just think (Duncan) relaxed once we scored some runs,” said GMG head coach Mick Long. “After that it was more about having fun, and you know how that turns into wins.

“He’s had some rough luck this year as a pitcher but that was a huge game for him. You’d like to think the defense could play that way but no, we didn’t expect that. Everybody played well.”

Gladbrook-Reinbeck misplayed the first two ground balls off the GMG bats, and the errors led directly to runs. With one out, Noah Teske and Duncan reached on errors before Duden drove an RBI single to left and Kaleb Gill followed with a run-scoring double to right-center field. G-R outfielders Hudson Clark and Logan Giesking halfway collided on the play, keeping GMG’s rally alive.

Wyatt Jackson followed with a fly ball to shallow right that second baseman Caleb Egesdal caught, and his lack of forward momentum allowed Duden to score from third on the sacrifice fly.

“We don’t want to get behind,” said G-R head coach Scott Kiburis. “All year we’ve been playing pretty solid defense and pitching it pretty good and getting on base, but the last couple games not so much. It gets tougher as it gets a little tighter — you can’t play as loose.

PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE

“I thought Nick pitched a really good game, he got us into the fifth inning with one earned run up to that point so we were a little shellshocked, especially when we didn’t come out and score a run in the first inning or two to combat that.”

Once in front, all Duncan had to do was throw strikes, but the Rebels couldn’t square him up.

“We had a talk on the bus on the way here and that got everybody going,” Duncan said. “That hyped everybody up, it was going good and we finished it.

“The dugout was fired up so that helped a lot.”

Duncan gave up just five hits over 5 2/3 innings against a Gladbrook-Reinbeck team that averaged 7.2 runs per game this season. The Rebels got solo runs in the second and sixth innings, but it wasn’t enough to overcome the defense’s early bobbles.

PHOTO BY ROSS THEDE

Isaac Clark and Luke Riffey had consecutive two-out singles in the second to get G-R on the board, but Riffey’s second RBI single in the sixth could only cut into GMG’s hefty lead by that point.

The Wolverines got a run off three straight singles against G-R right-hander Nick Tscherter in the fifth, as Collin Teske, Noah Teske and Duncan each reached safely. Noah Teske was thrown out trying to score from second on Duncan’s one-out single to left, and G-R catcher William Kiburis completed a 7-5-2-4 double play by catching Duncan trying to take second on the throw home.

The resistance only lasted so long, however, as GMG piled up three more runs against a trio of G-R pitchers in the top of the sixth.

Gill reached with a one-out single that chased Tscherter from the mound, and Giesking hit Jackson with his first offering in relief. Rider Kupka singled on a bunt to load the bases, and Giesking grazed Ethan Klemsrud to force in a run. Another walk to Collin Teske made it 6-1, and Austen Mathern walked his first batter Noah Teske to make it a 7-1 deficit for the Rebels.

Giesking reached with a leadoff walk to start the sixth — the first leadoff batter to get on base against Duncan — and scored on Riffey’s two-out single. Duncan was relieved by Duden after hitting the 110-pitch count limit on the nose, but Duden retired Austin Vaverka on strikes to get out of the jam.

Hudson Clark coaxed a leadoff walk from Duden in the seventh, but GMG’s defense made three straight plays to put the win away.

The Wolverines now advance to the district finals for the first time since 2009, where they will face BGM (11-12) in a surprising turn of events. The Bears knocked off fifth-ranked Don Bosco (26-6) with a 3-2, eight-inning victory in Wednesday’s second game in Reinbeck.

Gladbrook-Reinbeck was ready and willing to see the Dons in the postseason for the second year in a row, but neither will be there when GMG and BGM collide on Saturday night at 7 p.m. The location of the District 7 finale has not yet been determined.

“Yeah, we probably surprised them, but we didn’t surprise us,” Long sasid. “The last time we played G-R we faced Kiburis and it was 3-2 going into the bottom of the fifth so I thought we could play with them.

“Our kids put the ball in play and that first inning was huge for us, but yeah we probably shocked them a little bit. We’ve had trouble scoring runs all year so that was huge. I expcted G-R to score more runs than they did but we made the plays and Zach threw a nice game, kept them off-balance.”