Leps Win at Iconic Venue, Staying Hot Ahead of Friday’s District Opener

The La Grange baseball team is officially on a hot streak, and it’s coming at just the right time, with district play starting this Friday.

The Leps (8-5) won their fourth game in a row Monday, beating Goliad 8-2 in a special game at Whataburger Field, the home of the Corpus Christi Hooks, the Houston Astros’ Double-A team.

“It was fun,” said La Grange head coach James Zaruba. “You could tell on the ride down that the kids were excited about playing there, and getting a win made it better ... Picking up that win before district was a big thing.”

The Leps begin district play Friday at home at 7 p.m against Bellville.

In that win over Goliad, La Grange’s Jonah Ehler pitched a complete game fivehitter, He also had two hits and scored twice. Eli Gillum had two hits including a double and scored two runs. Ryder Klesel and Baylee Abbey also had two hits. Colt Jobb scored two runs.

“It was a great opportunity to play at that beautiful field,” Ehler said.

It’s been a strong start to the season for the Leps, coming on the heels of last year’s run to the third round of the playoffs (the program’s longest postseason run since 2013). But last year’s team included seven key seniors. Somehow, despite graduating all those players, these Leps have managed to reload with a very young 2026 team that only has one senior (Oliver Gunn, who because of a knee injury will be very limited this season).

“All of our young players, we’ve played together for a long time. We have that built-in chemistry, and we’ve adapted well,” Ehler said.

“We’ve got a lot of young talent. The kids buy in to what they have to do for the team,” Zaruba said. “We mixed and matched early in the year. Our JV last year was loaded with a lot of infielders, which was a lot of the players we lost last year, and we just moved people in those missing spots.”

No other team in La Grange’s District 22-4A has looked especially formidable in non-district play this season. In fact, the Leps and Caldwell (who tied for the district title last year) are the only teams with winning records right now.

“Like last year, it’s going to be a battle to the end in this district. Zaruba said.

The Leps will head into district with sophomore Tristan Ulrich and Ehler as their two starting pitchers with a host of other quality pitchers Zaruba can call on for relief.

“We’ve got a lot of arms, a lot of young arms,:” Zaruba said.

Both Ulrich and Ehler have tossed complete game shutouts this season “We had really good pitching last year, but I think we’ve got better pitching this year,” Ulrich said. “We’ve just got to score some runs.”