DENVER — This is a resilient bunch. In the Class 5A baseball tournament, that counts for everything.
Rocky Mountain beat arguably the state’s hottest baseball team (Regis Jesuit) to open tournament play Friday afternoon, then took down the defending champion (ThunderRidge) in the evening. Both were one-run games, both decided late.
Both wins proved these Lobos, runner-up a year ago in Class 5A, are built to handle adversity in close games. Because of that, they may be the favorite here this season.
“We’ve got tough kids,” Rocky Mountain coach Scott Bullock said on the field at Bishop Machebeuf High School, site of one half of the 5A bracket. “I wouldn’t expect anything different from them today to come out and just compete against some really, really good baseball teams.”
Bullock’s squad had its stumbles early this season, namely an 0-2 start in Front Range League play, but they’d won 13 straight games since then. Still, Rocky drew Regis Jesuit in the first round of the state tournament, a team that had won its final 15 games and gone unbeaten in the always tough Continental League.
It was not an ideal first-round matchup.
The game was 1-1 most of the way until Rocky’s Garrett Hammer hit a two-out RBI single in the sixth. Tyler Stevens then polished off his complete-game three-hitter in the top of the seventh and the Lobos earned an evening showdown with ThunderRidge, which outlasted Fairview 10-2 in a tough eight-inning game Friday morning.
The evening’s game was a rematch of last year’s championship, as well as a 9-7 Rocky Mountain win to close the regular season on May 5. And Rocky Mountain looked as though it might run away and hide early with a five-hit, three-run first inning.
But ThunderRidge sophomore Jake Eissler dug in and retired the next 11 Lobos he faced. And then the Grizzlies erupted for four runs in the third inning to seize a 4-3 lead. The latter damage was done against the Lobos’ Carl Stajduhar, no less — he of a 1.89 ERA entering Friday.
“I almost went and got him,” Bullock said. “It just kind of felt like he was losing it a bit.”
Instead, Stajduhar stayed in the game. And, at the urging of his pitching coach, adjusted.
“We were pitching outside and they were just going with it,” Stajduhar said. “So I started working inside a little more, getting in on their hands.”
Stajduhar would go four more innings, and allow just four more hits. But Rocky Mountain still trailed 4-3, and still needed to get to extras.
Enter Nathan Elsheimer. The senior’s run-scoring single up the middle knotted the game at 4 in the bottom of the sixth. The teams went scoreless in the seventh, sending the game to extras, and then scoreless again in the eighth.
Lobos closer Cory Richer came in for the top of the ninth and faced the heart of ThunderRidge’s lineup. He walked the Grizzlies’ Josh Brown to open things, and red-hot star Brody Westmoreland — who already had five RBIs over his team’s two games on Friday — hit an infield single.
But Richer got AJ Jones to strikeout, and then Mark Hopper smoked a ball — right at the Lobos’ Stevens, who had moved to third base for the second game. Stevens doubled up Brown at second, and the threat ended.
Elsheimer led off the bottom of the ninth with a single for Rocky Mountain and Zach Hahn reached on an error. That prompted an intentional walk of Cole Anderson to load the bases and set up a force play at home.
The very next pitch, ThunderRidge closer Tyler Loptien — who was scary good at times on the mound Friday — hit Dean Lawson with a curveball. Elsheimer walked in from third. Game over. 5-4, Rocky.
“Didn’t mean to wear it, but he’s got a good curveball, so I just figured I had to stay in there,” Lawson said. “I saw it coming at me, but I thought it would break back into the zone, so I stayed in there and it ended up hitting me. It felt pretty good. Especially for a hit-by-pitch.”
Said Bullock of the ugly way to win a game: “Dang right I’ll take it.”
And so will Rocky, which has another close win under its belt. The Lobos have played in five games decided by two runs or less.
“I love what our team is doing this year,” Lawson said. “I love beating adversity with these guys. I like winning games like that more than winning easy games, because I think those are the types of games that we’re going to be having for the rest of the season.”
“In the past,” Stajduhar said, “it’s come down to close games and we haven’t been able to pull it out. This year, we’ve just been on the grind. We’ve been grinding every day, working hard every day at practice, getting the extra hacks and getting everything in.
“I think it’s really paying off for us. Late in the season, I think it’s really going to keep paying off for us.”
Now, Rocky Mountain will play Mountain Vista at 3 p.m. Saturday at All-City Field, with the winner in firm control of the entire tournament.
“You know what? This first day’s tough, especially when you draw the 12:30 game,” Bullock said. “Especially when you draw our side of the bracket — don’t get me wrong, the other side’s tough, too — but Regis and the season they’ve had, and then the defending state champions. We really felt like today was a big day in the tournament. We know there’s a lot left.”
