CHAMPAIGN — After a successful season in which the Danville Post 210 Speakers limited themselves to a record-low 10 losses under manager Adam Decker (tying the mark accomplished in 2003 and 2004), they had a pretty good feeling that this was their year to return to the state tournament for the first time in three years.

And riding a five-game winning streak, the Speakers sat in prime position going into the last day of Division tournament play, working their way through the winner’s bracket. But the trip to the state tournament the Speakers have been attempting to make the last two years once again eluded them as they fell 14-3 in seven innings to Mattoon Post 88.

It was the second loss in a row to Post 88, a team they had split with the previous six meetings.

“Last year when we played these guys, we knew they were good and we had to beat them twice,” Danville pitcher Blake Janesky said. “But this year, we won the important game early, and we failed to finish it off. It sucks three years in a row losing the Division Championship. I have never been to state other than in junior ball.

“This is the best team I have been on since I’ve been up here. We may not have the size that we used to have, but we have more of a team mentality than we have before.”

That team mentality helped the Speakers to 34 wins, and an opportunity to even add to that total. Unfortunately for Danville, the offense that had carried it throughout the regular season ran dry, managing only four hits in the team’s final game with three coming on solo home runs.

Aaron Lewellyn, Tyler McKenzie and Chuckie Robinson accounted for the homers. McKenzie had the only other hit on a third-inning double.

The Speakers’ best scoring opportunity came in their first at bat of the day in the bottom of the third (after the game was suspended Saturday night because of lightening).

With runners on second and third and only one out, a chance to tie the game or take the lead went sour when the following two batters popped out and grounded out, both to the third baseman.

“Home runs are nice and all, but when they’re leadoff home runs and solo home runs, it’s a motivation boost but it doesn’t really do anything for the inning because it’s just another leadoff guy,” Lewellyn said. “We just couldn’t string hits together like we needed to, and that’s basically what Mattoon did. They didn’t have a whole lot of great line drives or anything. They just strung hits together.

“Everything was there,” he continued. “It was ours for the taking. We just kind of sputtered there at the end. Our offense stalled, and that’s been something that hasn’t stalled all year. I think that just kind of threw us off rhythm and we just couldn’t find it anymore.”

The backbreaking inning for the Speakers came in the fifth when Post 88 sent a 11 batters to the plate and took an 8-1 lead with five runs on five hits, including a leadoff home run and a two-run homer later in the inning.

Danville used four pitchers in the game, and six different hurlers against Mattoon in the back-to-back losses. None of them had a long-term answer for the 2010 Division Four champs.

“We were feeling good,” said Joe Pratt, who pitched eight innings in Danville’s semifinal win over Mattoon. “We made that late run in the last couple innings of that first game. We figured it would carry over into the next game. They came out and took an early lead, then the rain came and we came back today feeling good.

“We were expecting to be here. We’ve been here for the last 20 years. We were expected to win, too, but sometimes it doesn’t work out that way.”

Despite losing Pratt, Janesky, Lewellyn, and Ryne Watson, Decker doesn’t anticipate that expectation to vanish. In fact, there are few reasons why the Speakers won’t repeat as District 18 champions. The only question is whether or not they can surpass the hurdle of earning the elusive Division crown.

“I don’t look at it as we haven’t got to state three years in a row,” Decker said. “I look at it as, we’re lucky to get there when we have. Look at all the teams that are sitting at home. In the last 10 years, the road to the state tournament has had to go through us. Either we’ve got there, or somebody has beat us.

“Mattoon has beat us, I think, maybe three times (in the last 10 years) in the Division championship game. I’m proud of that to be honest, and I think that says something that almost every year, year in and year out, we’re playing for the Division championship of Central Illinois, basically, in American Legion baseball.

“I’m disappointed that we’re not going to state, but at the same time, we’ve had a really good year, and one of the best years I’ve ever had. It’s fun to come to the ball park with this group because you know you’re going to get their best effort, and they can play the game.”