PORT ANGELES — The Port Angeles baseball team’s important week ended with a third consecutive loss.
The Roughriders missed a chance to essentially lock down a district berth by falling to Bremerton 11-3 at Civic Field on Friday.
Port Angeles also lost to North Mason and Sequim last week. The Riders (5-5, 8-7), Knights (4-6, 6-8), Bulldogs (4-6, 7-10) and Wolves (5-5, 9-7) are in a four-team tussle for the Olympic League 2A Division’s final three postseason berths.
Port Angeles finishes its league slate with games against the top two teams, first at North Kitsap (8-2, 14-3) on Tuesday and then at home Wednesday against Olympic (8-2, 10-5) in a rare night game.
Riders ace Travis Paynter rolled through the first three innings of Friday’s game, but four hits, two walks and an error helped Bremerton put up five runs in the fourth inning.
The Knights added a run in the fifth, three more in the sixth and two in the seventh.
Ben Basden, Ricky Crawford and Curan Bradley each had hits and scored runs for the Riders.
Connor Heilman and Micaiah Anderson also had hits for Port Angeles.
The Riders don’t necessarily have to win both of its remaining games to make it into the postseason, because Sequim has to face Olympic and North Mason, North Mason has to play Bremerton and Sequim, and Bremerton finishes with North Mason and Kingston.
With so many head-to-head matchups between the Wolves, Knights and Bulldogs, there are guaranteed to be additional losses suffered by those
three teams.
And in the event of a tie, the Riders have a powerful tiebreaker card up their sleeve in the form of last month’s win over North Kitsap.
Of course, Port Angeles would rather not lean on that or the losses by the other teams.
“We can help ourselves by getting North [Kitsap] or Olympic,” Riders coach Vic Reykdal said.
Bremerton 11, Port Angeles 3
Bremerton 0 0 0 5 1 3 2 — 11 14 0
Port Angeles 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 — 3 5 1
WP- Zurbrugg; LP- Paynter
Pitching Statistics
Port Angeles: Paynter 5 2/3 IP, 9 R, 8 ER, 12 H, 4 K, 3 BB; Rodocker 1 1/3 IP, 2 R, 2 H, K, BB.
Bremerton: Zurbrugg 7 IP, 5 H.
Hitting Statistics
Port Angeles: Heilman 1-2; Basden 1-2, R; Crawford 1-3, R; Bradley 1-3, R; Anderson 1-1.
Sequim 8, Kingston 0
KINGSTON — Evan Hurn hit a three-run home run in a six-run second inning as the Wolves moved into a tie with Port Angeles for third place in Olympic League 2A.
With two outs and Dusty Bates and Tanner Rhodefer on base, Hurn homered to right-center field to extend Sequim’s advantage to 6-0.
The Wolves added some padding to their lead with two more runs in the fourth inning.
Sequim pitchers James Grubb and Austin Hilliard combined to hold the Buccaneers to one hit.
Grubb went six innings, striking out six, walking five and allowing only a single.
Hilliard worked the seventh inning and fanned two.
Sequim (5-5, 8-7) finishes its league schedule with a pair of home games, first against Olympic (8-2, 10-5) on Monday, and then against North Mason (4-6, 7-10) on Wednesday.
Sequim 8, Kingston 0
Sequim 0 6 0 2 0 0 0 — 8 7 0
Kingston 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 — 0 1 3
WP- Grubb; LP- Sather
Pitching Statistics
Sequim: Grubb 6 IP, H, 5 BB, 6 K; Hilliard IP, BB, 2 K.
Kingston: Sather 7 IP, 8 R, 6 ER, BB, 6 K.
Hitting Statistics
Sequim: Hurn 1-3, HR, 3 RBI; Christian 1-3, 2B, R; Rhodefer 1-3, 2 R, RBI, SB; Dennis 1-3, RBI; Hilliard 1-3, RBI; Velarde 1-3, 2 R, 2 SB; Harker 1-3, R.
Kingston: Moutray 1-3.
Quilcene 9, 14,
Seattle Lutheran 1, 5
QUILCENE — The Rangers locked down the SeaTac League championship with a doubleheader sweep of the Saints.
“Proud of . . . my guys,” Quilcene coach Darrin Dotson said following Friday’s wins.
“They stayed grounded and focused. They never stopped fighting as they had their eyes on the prize.
“I’m sure we shocked a few people this year, within the league and locally. Six starters graduated last year; [we had a] new coaching staff, one senior and four eighth-graders.”
Eli Harrison struck out 16 of the 29 batters he faced in Quilcene’s 9-1 win in the opener. Harrison allowed only four hits and one walk and was backed by a defense that committed only one error.
A.J. Prater, Ben Bruner, Nate Weller, Olin Reynolds, Dillon McEwards and Harrison combined for eight hits and nine runs.
Seattle Lutheran started the second game crushing the ball against Rangers hurler Andrew Johnston, and the Saints held a 5-4 lead heading into the bottom of the sixth inning.
Then Quilcene took off, plating eight runs in its half of the sixth to put the game to bed.
Bruner tripled for the Rangers; Weller singled, doubled and tripled; Harrison tripled; Prater and Jarod Smith both had hits; and Ethan Davis legged out and infield single that was followed by aggressive base running.
McEdwards was hit by five pitches between the two games.
“[He] wore those bad pitches like an ugly Christmas sweater,” Dotson said.
After the shaky start, Johnston rebounded to hold the Saints to five runs off nine hits, while striking out eight, walking one batter and hitting another with a pitch.
“Andrew Johnston never cracked or showed any emotion,” Dotson said.
“He remained on the hill and settled in.”
In 11 league games, the Rangers are 9-2 and have scored 121 runs and given up only 47.
Elma 6, 10,
Forks 2, 0
BEAVER — The tough breaks came in hot and heavy this week for the beleaguered Spartans as they dropped a pair of Evergreen League contests to Elma by scores of 6-2 and 10-0.
Wednesday in Beaver, Forks squandered a valiant pitching effort by hurler Javier Contreras.
Unearned runs and fortuitous hitting from the Eagles were the ultimate undoing of Contreras, who saw a slim 2-1 deficit metastasize into a 6-1 diagnosis during a fatal sixth frame.
On the day, Contreras surrendered just three earned runs while striking out seven and turning in another complete-game performance.
Reece Blattner literally stole Forks’ first run of the game in the second inning.
Blattner legged out an infield single and then rumbled into second base on the ensuing overthrow.
During the following at-bat, Blattner managed to swipe third base with a slick pop-up slide.
When the next Spartans’ batter went down on strikes and two outs were hung on the scoreboard, the freshman calmly swiped home.
Chance Wilson tacked on Forks’ other run of the game on a wild pitch in the sixth inning after being moved into scoring position by a Contreras single.
Parker Browning and Billy Palmer also tallied hits for Forks, and Blattner added another single in the seventh inning.
“If we don’t have that one bad inning, we’re still out here playing baseball,” Forks coach Wayne Daman said.
“Some breaks just didn’t go our way today, and that was the difference.”
Thursday’s game was played in Elma, but the outcome was no more kind for Forks.
Elma senior pitcher Cole Thornock managed a five-inning no-hitter against the visitors.
The Spartans did manage four base runners on the day thanks to three walks and a first-inning outfield error.
“You’ve just got to tip your cap to a guy,” said Daman. “Sometimes it’s just the other guy’s day.”
Freshman Chance Wilson took the loss for Forks.
Wilson and sophomore Gavin Palmer both distinguished themselves defensively.
Wilson registered a set of snags on Eagle pop flies, once sliding on his knees to corral a foul pop-up near his third base position and once snaring a ball over his shoulder near the foul line in left field from his sometimes home a shortstop.
Palmer continued his sniper-like assault on base thieves by routinely dotting his throws on the corner of the bag.
Forks (0-12) hosts a senior night date with Aberdeen on Tuesday.