One of southeast Iowa’s longest-standing rivalries returns to the baseball diamond tonight when the Washington Demons travel to Mount Pleasant for a conference doubleheader on KCII.

Washington suffered a 14-8 loss to Burlington last time out and has a record of 4-10, but the Demons picked up their first Southeast Conference wins of the season last week against Keokuk.

Conner Leyden leads the lineup with .324 batting average, four doubles, six runs batted in and 11 runs scored, while fellow senior Nate Edmonds and freshman Mitchell Zieglowsky have made a solid tandem at the top of the order, combining to hit .292 and score 17 runs.

Blayze Richardson is also swinging it well for Washington, batting .375 over his last seven games, and the sophomore is part of a balanced group of pitchers, including Leyden and eighth-grader Julian Parsons, who have combined for a 3.04 earned-run average. Head coach TJ Rausch tells KCII Sports that the past week showed that the Demons won’t back down from a challenge.

“Our fight is still there,” Rausch says. “Our boys care, they still want it, and it’s just minimizing our mistakes [and] making sure that we’re not starting off with a deficit, and if we do start with a deficit, we need to come back and make sure that we answer.”

Washington is facing a Mount Pleasant team that is 10-8 overall and 5-4 in conference play. J.C. Sitar and his .385 average and team-high 17 RBI are a big reason why the Panthers have won eight of their last 11 games. Fellow seniors Payton Walker and Brayton Hutson joined Sitar in each having two RBI when they beat the Demons 9-3 earlier this season.

You can catch all the action in both games as Washington take on long-time rival Mount Pleasant this evening on 106.1 FM and streaming on KCIIradio.com and the KCII1 app, starting with the Countdown to First Pitch at 5 o’clock.