4A baseball semifinals: Green Mountain, Lewis-Palmer to vie for title
DENVER — There’s a hundred different ways to win a baseball game, but if someone told Green Mountain coach Brad Madden that his team would still be undefeated in the Class 4A baseball state tournament after notching only two hits Tuesday, he might not have believed it.
“I would have been shocked,” said a smiling Madden after his Rams eked out a 2-1 victory over the D’Evelyn Jaguars at the Regency Athletic Complex at Metro State University in Denver on Tuesday.
The win means the Rams are just one more victory away from capturing their second-straight 4A championship.
Despite struggling to make solid contact, the Rams threatened to score all afternoon courtesy of eight walks handed out by D’Evelyn pitching. Green Mountain was able to take advantage in the first inning after leadoff hitter Wyatt Featherston drew a walk, stole third, and scored on pitcher Talon Schaller’s RBI-single.
From there though runs were as hard to come by as hits thanks to Jaguar starter Cameron Brown, who made up for the free passes by fanning 12 in six and one-third. Green Mountain left the bases loaded in the second and two men on in the third when Brown struck out the side.
On the day, Brown was able to strand eight Ram base-runners.
“Cam’s a really good pitcher; I knew it was going to be hard to get runs off him. We got a lot of base-runners early but sometimes I think that takes you out of your rhythm as a hitter,” said Madden. “Just all the walks. It sounds funny but you don’t dig in and get ready to go. I think both teams are kind of kicking themselves about not getting runs in during the game there.”
Those missed opportunities didn’t hurt the Rams as much as they could have thanks to the work of starter Schaller, who excelled on the mound as well as at the plate. The senior gave up an unearned run in the top of the third after Jaguar sophomore Christian Cedillo singled and came around to score on a three-base error, but Schaller was able to work around a few jams of his own.
D’Evelyn’s biggest threat came in the sixth, but Schaller fanned two straight to work out of a bases-loaded jam and keep the game tied at 1-1 heading into the final frame.
“Talon goes bases loaded there with no outs and gets out of it in the sixth. That’s guts, and that’s why we went with him today,” said Madden. “He was a superstar for us last year and today was the same situation. We know he’s a tough kid so that’s why we wanted him out there.”
Schaller allowed zero earned runs, one unearned, in seven innings and went 1-3 with his team’s only RBI at the plate.
With both pitchers mowing batters down, Green Mountain’s patience finally paid off in the seventh. With one out, Brown walked two batters and was replaced by D’Evelyn senior Grant Witherspoon.
After another strikeout and a double-steal, junior Ram Roy Anderson was at third-base with two outs and, according to his coach, leaning a little too much back towards third base – though that didn’t matter when Anderson scored the walk-off run on a wild-pitch.
“We talked about it right before that pitch as a matter of fact. I said hey you’re going the wrong direction, we’re going to score on a passed ball right here,” said Madden. “It was more wishful thinking that being a prophet.”
“Coach said, ‘Why are you going back? Go forward.’ I told him I was going forward the whole time,” said Anderson, who raced home on a ball in the dirt that Jaguar catcher Matt Helmrich was unable to get a glove on.
“It just snuck between the catchers legs. It was a dream come true.”
The win means that undefeated Green Mountain will take on the one-loss Lewis-Palmer Rangers, who defeated the Ponderosa Mustangs 8-0 Tuesday behind junior Paul Tillotson’s seven shutout innings to advance to the finale of the double-elimination tournament Wednesday.
The Rams need to win once, while the Rangers would need to beat Green Mountain twice in order to secure the championship.
Senior Colin Cicere will take the mound tomorrow for the Rangers. Cicere gave up just two hits in a complete-game shutout of Evergreen last Thursday.
“We’ll see if we can get one tomorrow from Cicere the way he did against Evergreen. We have nothing to lose,” said Lewis-Palmer coach Tom McCabe after his team’s win. “Obviously the most important one is game one. We take game one anything can happen. The boys are confident, I’m confident. At this stage, we’re just going to go out and play the game, execute, and see if we can do this.”
It is the first appearance in a title game in Lewis-Palmer’s baseball history.
First pitch is scheduled for 1 p.m. at the Regency Athletic Complex at Metro State University in Denver. First pitch for the second game is scheduled for 3:30, if necessary.
