Chaparral Firebirds edge out Sandite Baseball 2-1 at Best of the West
/Story by: Scott Emigh, Editor-in-Chief
The Charles Page High School varsity baseball team (4-2) gave up their second loss of the season 2-1 to Chaparral High (11-2) at the Best of the West tournament in Phoenix, Arizona Tuesday.
Josh Cordell (0-1) got the loss on the mound for the Sandites in his first time pitching this season. He gave up six hits, two walks, and two runs, but struck out three and threw 65% strikes.
Neither team got off a hit in the first inning. Tyler Stokes was walked for the Firebirds, but was picked off at first base. Joey Montgomery reached first on an error to start the second, then stole second on another error with Hunter Greathouse at bat and advanced to third on a sacrifice fly, but was ultimately left stranded as both Josh Taber and Jake Terry were put out on right field flies.
Chaparral stranded one in the second and Page stranded Treyce Tolbert in the top of the third. In the bottom of the inning Ian McMillan singled to left field, stole second with Stokes at bat, and was batted home on a Jacob Gonzalez single. Gonzalez and Stokes, who was walked, were both left stranded by Harrison Jones, but the Firebirds had a 1-0 lead going into the fourth.
Jake Ward singled to start the fourth, but Montgomery, Greathouse, and Taber all flied out to bring in Chaparral for another successful offensive performance.
Alex Segal hit a lead-off double, followed by Hampton with a bunt single. Gianni Tomasi batted in Segal on a sacrifice fly to right field for the second run of the game, and that was all the Firebirds would need.
Tyler McCallie doubled with a hard grounder to left field and was batted in on a line drive double by Treyce Tolbert. By that point the Sandites had two outs and Tolbert was stranded on a fly by Rhett Rutledge.
The Sandites fielded three outs to end the inning and came in for a big rally attempt. Ward struck out swinging, but Montgomery doubled to right field and courtesy runner Mack Thompson reached third on a grounder from Greathouse. Kameron Adcock replaced Greathouse and Taber was walked to load the bases with one out. Thompson was caught stealing, however, and Jake Terry struck out swinging to strand the Sandite rally attempt along with two runners.
Cordell struck out two in the bottom of the sixth, but none of the Sandites landed on base to start the seventh and the Firebirds walked away with their third win of the tournament.
