By DAVE BELCHER
Moapa Valley Progress
The Moapa Valley High School Varsity baseball team started its season last week in Las Vegas at the Eldorado High School Invitational. The Pirates came away with a 1-3 record.
They played three very close games and one game which was filled with errors. Two of the Pirates games went into extra innings and ended with a one run lose.
The first game was against Desert Pines where the Pirates came away with a 9-1 win.
Desert Pines started the first inning with a run giving the Jaguars a 1-0 lead. They held that lead until the 6th inning when the Pirate bats came alive. The Pirates scored 9 runs in the bottom of the 6th.
Moapa Valley had a total of 15 hits led by Chaz Cornwall who connected with the ball throughout the whole tournament. When the ball wasn’t finding a hole for Chaz he was hitting at-em balls.
Pirate pitchers did a great job forcing hitters to hit the ball to Moapa Valley fielders. In the Desert Pines game they held the Jaguars to just five hits.
The second game against Eldorado went into extra innings. California rules were in force during the tournament which meant that in extra innings the last out in the previous inning started at second base. With the game scoreless headed into the extra inning the Pirates started with T.C. Twelker at second base by rule. After a successful bunt moved him over to third base a single scored him giving the Pirates the lead heading into the bottom of the 8th.
Eldorado started with a runner on second and advanced him with a bunt then a single scored him.
The next play resulted in a Pirate error as the ball was hit up the middle. It was fielded at second base for a routine double play. But the ball was thrown past the covering short stop and into left field. Eldorado scored the game winner for a final of 2-1.
Moapa Valley then travelled to Mojave High School for their third game on Saturday. It was an early game. The Pirates left at 6:30 am to make the 9:00 am game. They had a rude awakening with 9 errors in a 16-7 loss to Mojave.
“We couldn’t throw in that game,” said Head Coach Gary Weiss. “The pitching was fine.The field was fine. We just couldn’t throw the ball.”
With that loss the Pirates faced Lincoln County of Panaca. Even though they are in Division III, Lincoln is a very good team. They had beaten Chaparral handily earlier in the tournament and gave the Pirates all they wanted.
Mojave High School field is set up so in the afternoon the right side meaning the first and second baseman and right fielder are in the sun.
Several routine hits which would be outs found their way as hits due to the sun. Lincoln took advantage of this making several hits into right field, raising havoc for the Pirates.
Eventually the game ended 5-5 forcing extra innings.
Moapa Valley scored three runs in their half of the inning and Lincoln County scored 4 for a 9-8 Lynx win.
“Our pitching did well in the tournament,” said Weiss. “We are going to be competitive this year and look to make the playoffs.”
