SIOUX FALLS — After a one-year absence, the Class B high school baseball championship is heading back to Dell Rapids.

The Quarriers cap-off an exceptional 28-2 season, going a perfect 25-0 against South Dakota opponents.

It felt like it was Dell Rapids championship to lose, being the No. 1 seed with the Class B player of the year and tournament MVP Jack Henry still available to pitch.

“Anytime you go undefeated in the regular season, your bound to have a target on your back,” said Henry. “We’ve had a target on our back for probably three years now so everybody is going to come with their best, but I just got to give credit to the guys for a good team win.”

After five innings the score stood 3-0, and Henry was rolling.

Dell Rapids outscored opponents 16-2 in three state tournament games, but the first runs scored against the Quarriers could not have been at a worse spot.

Closing in on a state championship in the sixth, the Quarriers were just five outs away from a state championship.

But Howard wasn’t going away easily, scoring two runs on a passed ball and a fielder’s choice to cut the Dell Rapids lead one with one final frame to play.

Heading to the seventh, Henry was running out of pitching, walking the tying run in his final batter of his illustrious high school career.

It became decision time for the Quarriers on who would come on to close, but for head coach Danny Miller, the decision was easy, bringing in Talan Millage in the closing stages of the championship.

“The velocity difference, the change of speeds, and Talan has a few pitches he can throw for strikes and a lot of it’s offspeed,” Miller said on electing to go with Millage. “They were seeing Jack who actually hit 90 miles per hour today, and then you bring in Talan who’s going to spin it up there a little bit.”

Going to Millage paid off in the long run, recording back-to-back outs to close out the win.

“They told me I had a chance of going in, but not in that type of situation was I expecting that,” Millage said.

Millage threw just five pitches in his save, but he understood what he needed to do to get the job done.

“My arm was hurting a little bit, so I knew I couldn’t throw super hard, so I was sticking to my offspeeds,” Millage said. “And they were moving, and they weren’t liking it.”

After recording a strikeout to win the state championship, Millage was relieved.

“At first I didn’t even think he was going to call it a strike,” said Millage. “But once he did, it was just straight happiness. I threw my glove and ran straight to my teammates.”