Olympic Sports Overcomes Heat, Errors To Earn State Trip

Olympic Sports shook off the effects of a 7-error, 8-walk loss to become the first Valley baseball team in eight years to make the American Legion state playoffs.

The team opened tournament play at Shadle Park’s Al K. Jackson Field, Wednesday. The tournament continues today and through the weekend.

After losing 9-5 to Eagle Hardware in the second game of the best-of-three playoffs, Olympic came back for an 8-3 win and state berth.

The score was tied 2-2 in the sixth when the team scored five times. In a seeding game they beat Maxwell House 12-1 in five innings.

“I thought the Southern Division was tougher than the North, it had better balance,” said Maxwell House coach Jeremy Naccarato.

Olympic, which shared third place in the South but reached state anyway, bore out his assessment.

“The kids found a way to win with the exception of one game,” said Olympic coach Don Ressa. “We had seven errors which was untypical of us. We just kind of let down.”

The next day, in 100-degree heat, Brad Valkenaar pitched his team to a standoff with Eagle after five innings.

“I went out in the bottom of the fifth and thought he had borderline heat stroke,” said Ressa. “I told him to find a way to get us out of the inning, took a T-shirt and stuck it in the ice bucket and draped it over him.”

After Valkenaar’s teammates produced five runs and a 7-2 lead, he told his coach, “I’m feeling a little better now.”

He completed the game, working out of a bases loaded, no out jam in the sixth.

Rob McGlothin, driven from the mound in the first inning of Olympic’s loss to Eagle, hurled a two-hitter at Maxwell House.

Brandon Florence, one of four players with two hits in the game, doubled twice. Brett Haiar had five hits in Saturday’s two games. Andy Dunham had three hits against Eagle Hardware.

Good year for Strike Zone

Strike Zone, the AA American Legion team from West Valley, may have had its season end early, but the players can’t quibble with the year they had.

They finished just a game out of first, losing by one-run to Maxwell House to miss the best-of-three portion of the league playoffs.

The 6-5 playoff loss that ended their season came despite the team’s outhitting Maxwell House 9-6 and despite the fact pitcher Jason Phillipe had blanked them 5-0 earlier in the year, striking out 16.

It was Phillipe’s only league loss of the summer and came because he walked 10 batters. Brian Lawler drove in three runs and Chris Johnson went 3-for-4.

Phillipe was 8-2 overall and struck out 85 batters in 67 innings. Fellow pitcher David Edwards was 6-0 in league with 37 strikeouts in 38 innings.

Chris Hilsabeck, who will be a sophomore this fall, led the team in hitting at .409, runs batted in with 21 and slugging percentage at .648.

Johnson played third base, hit .348 and drove in 18 runs. Second baseman Ian Harty hit .344 and like Hilsabeck will be a sophomore next year.

, DataTimes