Steve Sneddon
RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
5/21/2004
The Reno Huskies will be gunning for their first NIAA 4A Baseball State championship in 20 years today.
They had to survive a wild shootout with Cimarron-Memorial before taking a 13-7 victory at McNutt Field in Carson City on Friday afternoon. The Spartans then played Silverado in an evening elimination game and won, 5-3, to move into a rematch at 10 a.m. today.
The Huskies, 35-5, can capture the state title with a win, but if the Spartans, 29-8, get the victory they will force another game for the title at 1 p.m. today. Friday’s game had a little of everything, including a triple play started by Reno third baseman Jake Johnson that killed any hopes of a comeback in a game, which had three lead changes.
The Spartans took a 4-0 lead in the top of the first inning, but Reno designated hitter Ryan Simpson showed that this wasn’t going to be a cakewalk with a three-run homer over the left-field fence in the bottom of the first. It was a gritty victory for the Huskies, who have won seven postseason games in a row since losing to McQueen, 4-3, in a first-round game in the Northern 4A Regional on May 12.
“Our kids believe in each other,” said Reno coach Pete Savage. “They have a good team attitude. It was a good team win. They’re constantly picking each other up.”
Johnson picked himself up with the sixth-inning triple play. He had committed two errors in the inning that contributed to the Spartans loading the bases after Reno had scored four runs in the bottom of the fifth to go ahead, 10-7.
Joel Reese hit a sharp, low line drive that a diving Johnson caught before lunging to third base for the force out and then threw to second base to complete the triple play.
“It was such a hard shot all I could do was react,” Johnson said. “It was a couple of inches (off the ground) … a couple of inches, the old cliché. I was hoping somebody would hit the ball to me. You dream of plays like that.”
It was the first time he had committed two errors in an inning since he was a sophomore in a game in Anaheim, Calif.
“I definitely didn’t end the inning on a triple play like that (in Anaheim),” Johnson said. “We don’t want to lose anymore. The loss to McQueen woke us up. You can’t let down anymore. We have to be up for everything.”
When Johnson made the catch, it raised the dust. Johnson said it was his glove hitting the dirt, not the ball.
“To be honest with you, I looked up, I thought it hit the ground,” said Cimarron-Memorial coach Mike Hubel. “It was a freak play. It killed us.”
A defensive letdown of significant proportions wounded the Spartans in the bottom of the fifth inning. After reliever John Wallace, who took the victory, led off the inning with a double, Drew Johnson and Steve Mays reached base on errors by the shortstop Reese. Wallace scored on the ball that Johnson hit to tie the game, 7-7.
After Simpson’s foul popup to first base, Davis’ sacrifice fly was dropped by right fielder Austin Lefevre for the go ahead run. The strong winds probably contributed to all three of the Spartans’ errors in the fifth and could have played a role in the two by Johnson in the sixth. Pinch-hitter Mike Hellen’s double to right-center scored Mays and Banks for the 10-7 lead.
“We fell apart … we committed three errors,” said Hubel. “There was nothing we could do after that.”
Wallace, who also hit a two-run homer to right-center in the sixth, relieved starting pitcher Chris Rickey and pitched the last 2 2/3 innings for the victory, giving up only one single. After the Spartans jumped to the early lead, Wallace, who played first base to begin the game, said he was confident that the Huskies could come back.
“They (the Spartans) were fired up because they had scored four runs in the first inning,” Wallace said. “We knew four runs weren’t enough for them, that we had enough sticks to come back slowly.”
The Huskies did have the offense to come back, but then they needed something that Jake Johnson provided in the sixth inning.
“It (the triple play) was an unbelievable play,” said Reno’s Savage. “Baseball is a game of preparation. It’s a game of luck sometimes.”
Luck is good to have in a shootout.