State baseball: Whitefish loses thriller, Polson falls
MISSOULA — As the State Baseball tournament continues through the weekend, it will be tough to top that opener.
Down to its last strike, Belgrade got a game-tying double in the seventh inning Thursday at Ogren-Allegiance Field. Then, after Whitefish pushed across two runs in the eighth inning, the Panthers scored three in their half.
The winning run came across on a bases-loaded squeeze bunt by Brayton Van Dyken.
The 8-7 loss dropped Whitefish (8-12) into a loser-out game at 11 a.m. Friday against Eureka. The Lions (15-4-1) fell to Florence 11-7 Thursday.
It was part of a rough day for the Northwest teams: Polson lost to Butte 12-6 in Thursday’s third game, meaning there will be a new state champion. In the late game, Hamilton beat Columbia Falls 10-7.
Belgrade and Florence will play in Friday’s 4 p.m. semifinal; at 6:30, Butte will take on Hamilton.
Belgrade 8, Whitefish 7
Gage Banks forced the extra innings, poking an 0-2 pitch just inside the right field line for an opposite-field double. That brought in Keenan Kraft — he’d doubled earlier — with the tying run.
Whitefish looked good after Tait Orme hit an RBI single in the eighth, and later came in on Michael Miller’s sacrifice fly.
But the Panthers opened their half with two straight singles, then got a one-out RBI base hit from Ryas Olsen. An error and walk loaded the bases, and Van Dyken squeezed home Olson with the winning run.
“That’s baseball in a way,” Bulldogs coach Kyler Blades said. “ I’m so proud of these guys, the way they reacted to adversity.”
Whitefish led early and often, starting with the second inning when Christian Schwaderer tripled and scored on Avery Caton’s grounder.
The Bulldogs’ Carson Bramme stole home in the second inning — part of a triple steal — for a 2-0 lead. In the fourth Caton doubled and scored on CJ Thew’s RBI grounder for a 3-2 lead.
In the sixth inning Whitefish went up 5-4 when Calvin Eisenbarth stole home, drawing a hurried pitch that sailed over the catcher’s head.
The only sub-.500 team in the field had the Panthers (15-3) on the ropes.
“They tied it in the seventh, we came back and put two more runs on the board,” Blades said. “We had some dicey steals — we had a steal of home to get us the lead — and I’m just so proud of these guys and how far they’ve come. And they proved they belong here.”
Whitefish 020 111 02 - 7 6 3
Belgrade 011 110 13 - 8 12 0
Brady Howke, Logan Stewart (5) and Avery Caton. Keenan Kraft, Gage Banks (5) and Braydon VanDyken.
WHITEFISH — Tait Orme 1-4, Ryan Conklin 1-4, Michael Miller 1-4, Christian Schwaderer 1-5, Caton 1-2, Reed Boyer 0-3, Calvin Eisenbarth 1-2, CJ Thew 1-3, Reyd Hobart 0-4, Howke 0-0, Carson Bramme 0-0.
BELGRADE — Ryas Olson 2-5, Sawyer Olson 2-5, Kraft 2-3, VanDyken 2-4, Banks 1-3, Hayden Robson 0-1, Keegan Cooke 0-2, Mason Zimmer 1-3, Max Dunning 0-0, Andrew Hazen 2-3, Landon Wanders 0-2.
2B — Caton, Kraft, Banks. 3B — Miller. RBIs — Thew 3, Miller, Schwaderer, Orme, VanDyken 2, R.Olson, Kraft, Banks, Robson.
Florence 11, Eureka 7
Mason Arlington hit an inside the park home run and scored three times, and the Falcons (16-1) coupled eight hits with 12 walks issued by Lions pitching.
Eureka trailed 8-3 at one point but closed to 8-7 on Tristan Butts’ sacrifice fly in the top of the sixth, which scored Rogan Lytle.
AJ Truman followed with a two-out shot to right-center, but the Falcons’ Trapper Oster tracked it down.
In the bottom of the inning Arlington took advantage of a steady wind blowing out to right, driving the ball to the fence and tearing around the bases. It was a two-run homer, making it 10-7. Jake Roth tripled and scored before the inning was over.
Lytle and Rowan Burow each scored twice for Eureka (15-4-1); Butts had two hits and he and Logan Cuffe each drove in two runs.
Eureka 201 121 0 7 6 5
Florence 251 003 x - 11 8 2
AJ Truman, Tristan Butts (4) and Butts, Rogan Lytle (4). Trapper Oster, Isaiah Testerman (4), Jake Roth (6) and Roth, Drew Wagner (6).
EUREKA — Lytle 1-1, Rowan Burow 1-4, Butts 2-3, Truman 0-3, Tyce Van Orden 0-4, Emmet McKim 0-2, Logan Cuff 1-3, Hunter Grieve 0-3, Tristan Libby 1-5.
FLORENCE — D.Wagner 1-3, Mason Arlington 1-2, Chase Wagner 2-5, Roth 1-2, Testerman 1-4, Wes Potter 1-1, Levi Winters 0-4, Caleb Katen 0-2, Oster 1-4.
2B — Libby. 3B — Roth. HR — Arlington. RBIs — Butts 2, Cuffe 2, Lytle, Truman, Van Orden, Arlington 2, Testerman 2, Potter 2, Wagner.
Butte 12, Polson 6
The Bulldogs (11-6) came to hit, knocking Polson’s Espn Fisher — the winning pitcher in last year’s state championship — out of the game in the third inning.
Back-to-back triples by Quinn Cox and Logan Carden sparked a three-run first inning for Butte; the jet stream blowing out to right might have helped Cayde Stajcar’s two-run triple in the second. He scored on a dropped fly ball to make it 6-0.
Fisher got a couple runs back with a two-run triple — a screamer past short that skipped all the way to the wall in left-center — that cut the gap to 6-4 in the bottom of the second..
But then Butte’s Zack O’Connell led off the third with a double, and thanks to a couple Pirate errors (they had five) and a double by Carden, it was soon 10-4.
It was 12-4 when Cole Haggard and Landon Shoemake hit back-to-back triples to start a two-run sixth inning for Polson. Butte went to reliever Jaxon Williamson at that point, and he finished the final two innings.
Stajcar drove in four runs, and scored three times for the Bulldogs. Will stephan also scored three times.
Butte 334 002 0 - 12 11 1
Polson 040 002 0 - 6 7 4
Derek Dunmire, Jaxon Williamson (6) and Quinn Cox. Espn Fisher, Cole Wadsworth (3), George Wyman (7) and Holden Emerson, Fisher (3).
BUTTE — Tocher Lee 1-4, Cayde Stajcar 3-3, Cox 2-3, Logan Carden 1-5, Alex Jorgensen 0-5, Matthew Donaldson 0-5, Zack O’Connell 1-3, Gavin Trudgeon 0-0, Karsen McEwen 1-4, Will Stephan 2-4, Mason Armstrong 0-0, Gavin Bushman 0-0.
POLSON — Cole Wadsworth 1-4, Fisher 1-4, Wyatt Wadsworth 1-2, Hunter Emerson 1-3, Holden Emerson 0-3, Zak Muzquiz 1-2, Landon Pablo 0-1, Cason Graham 0-0, Cole Haggard 1-3, Landon Shoemake 1-2, Aiden Gfroerer 0-3.
2B — Cox, O’Connell. 3B — Stajcar, Carden, Cox, Fisher, Haggard, Shoemake. RBIs — Stajcar 4, Cox 2, Carden 2, Donaldson, Stepan, Fisher 2, C.Wadsworth, Shoemake, Gfroerer..
Hamilton 10, C-Falls 7
Hamilton’s six-run fifth inning gave the Broncs an insurmountable 10-4 lead, although the Wildcats tried.
Reggie Sapa singled and Dominick Young walked to start the sixth inning, and both scored on RBI groundouts from Kellen Kroger and Cody Schweikert to cut the gap to 10-6. In the seventh AC Chilson reached on an error to lead off and came in on Connor Venezio’s one-out single.
But then Jackson Lubke got the next two hitters via strikeout and groundout.
Sapa had two hits and scored twice; Kroger, Schweikert and Chilson all drove in two runs for Columbia Falls (15-3), which will play a 1:30 p.m. loser-out with Polson. Chilson and Schweikert each hit a triple.
Kroger threw four innings on the mound; Dawson Juntunen started the fifth, when Hamilton (17-3) made its charge.The big hit was a three-run double by Atticus Southwell that made it 8-4.
Hamilton 003 160 0 - 10 8 3
C-Falls 202 002 1 - 7 9 2
Cash Lawrence, Taylor Nead (6), Jackson Lubke (7) and Elijah McNair-Neal. Kellen Kroger, Dawson Juntunen (5), Jett Pitts (5), Dominick Young (7) and AC Chilson.
HAMILTON — Andrew Ricklefs 1-5, Lubke 1-3, Connor Ekin 1-4, Boedy Tadvick 0-2, Tyce O’Connell 1-2, Jackson Jessop 0-1, Hunter Harrness 0-2, Atticus Southwell 2-4, Brady DeMoss 0-0, T DeMoss 2-4, McNair-Neal 0-1.
COLUMBIA FALLS — Reggis Sapa 2-3, Young 1-4, Kroger 2-3, Cody Schweikert 1-4, Mathew Mitts 0-4, Chilson 1-4, Pitts 1-3, Dayne Tu 0-2, Connor Venezio 1-1, Jace Hill 0-1, Juntunen 0-2.
2B — Southwell 2, Ricklefs. 3B — Chilson, Schweikert. RBIs — Southwell 3, McNair-Neal, Eken, Harness, Lubke, Ricklefs, Chilson 2, Kroger 2, Schweikert 2, Venezio.
State Baseball Tournament
May 16-18
Ogren/Allegiance Field, Missoula
Thursday
Game 1 — Belgrade 8, Whitefish 7, 8 innings
Game 2 — Florence 11, Eureka 7
Game 3 — Butte 12, Polson 8
Game 4 — Hamilton 10, Columbia Falls 7
Friday
Game 5 — Whitefish (8-12) vs. Eureka (15-4-1), 11 a.m., loser out
Game 6 — Polson (14-5) vs. Columbia Falls (15-3), 1:30 p.m., loser out
Game 7 — Belgrade (15-3) vs. Florence (16-1), 4 p.m., semifinal
Game 8 — Butte (11-6) vs. Hamilton (17-3), 6:30 p.m., semifinal
Saturday
Mt. Sentinel Fields
Game 9 — Winner 5 vs. Loser 8, Field 5, 10 a.m. lo
Game 10 — Winner 6 vs. Lost 7, Field 6, 10 a.m., lo
Ogren-Allegiance Field
Game 11 — Winner 10 vs. Winner 9, 4 p.m., third
Game 12 — Championship, 6:30 p.m.