McDonald’s, Dr. DeCounter DDS league winners

The Spokane Valley Baseball League season came to an end with two well-played title games in the youth Midget and PeeWee league playoffs.

McDonald’s (Adams) defeated White Elephant (University) 4-2 for the Midget crown and Dr. DeCounter DDS (Pasadena) beat Mountain Dew (Liberty Lake) 5-2 to win the Pee Wee championship.

“Both were excellent games,” said Valley Baseball director Mike Asan of the 9- to 10-year-old and 11- to 12-year-old age groups. “There were outstanding defensive plays. They were exciting and good games to watch, and the teams were first-class on both sides.”

The games were played last Friday and Saturday at West Valley High School.

McDonald’s avenges losses

All three of McDonald’s losses came in the first half of the regular season to teams that ultimately reached the playoffs.

The team avenged two of them en route to the championship.

“We had a little difficulty with University and East Farms in the beginning, but then started coming around pretty good,” said coach Mike Townsend.

McDonald’s (12-3) won its final nine games, including 11-9 in regular season and in the title contest over White Elephant after beating Spokane County Sheriff’s Officers (East Farms) 13-6 in the playoff semifinals.

It was a startling turnaround for a team that went 2-10 the year before.

“We were pretty close to dead last,” said Townsend. “They matured a lot over the winter. We told them if they were going to play, they will play hard and they did a 180 degree turn.”

Nine of the players were back from what had been a young team.

“They’ve been playing together for three years,” Townsend said. “They knew how to relay on and back up each other and stepped up to the plate when they needed to.”

In the title game, McDonald’s fell behind in the top of the second inning on doubles by White Elephant’s Devon Thompson and Ryan Sutherland.

But the champions backed strong pitching by Micha Haslett to rally on an RBI by Dalton Townsend and steal home by Jordan Wilson.

The team upped its lead to 4-1 before Thompson scored again on Joel Brooks‘ double in the fifth, but a bases-loaded double play on a long fly out ended the threat.

Greg Johnson led the team with 21 RBIs during the year followed by Lucas Knapton and Townsend. Tate Murphey led the team with three home runs and Townsend had two. Wilson led the team with 23 stolen bases.

But all of the 14 team members had an impact, including Scott Bischoff, Trevor Emerson, Jacob Gould, Jeff Hiett, Michael Kilduff, Dillon Knapton, Michael Barnhart and Shane Flesher.

“I don’t remember Adams being in the playoffs for a long, long time,” said Townsend.

This Adams group has a championship to brag about.

Future Eagles win at ‘home’

Just getting to the finals was enough for Dr. DeCounter.

“The championship was at West Valley,” said coach Ken Wells. “The kids were excited because, they said, one day we’re going to be playing here.”

Not that there isn’t a certain WV legacy of success. Five players are children of Eagle athletic families who stood out in their day.

Harrison and Hunter Wells, are sons of the coach and Peggy (Almquist), an Eagle star circa 1985 and former WV volleyball coach. Alex Preston‘s mom Carol (Zimmer) was also an Eagle athlete who succeeded Wells as volleyball coach. His dad, John, is cross country coach at Central Valley.

And there are Bergman (Brady Bergman) and Riggs (Brandon Davis) family athletic lines as well.

So Ken Wells had good genetics to work with.

“We didn’t score a ton of runs,” said Wells, ticking off a list of low-scoring games. “But it’s the same for any baseball team. Good pitching and defense will take you quite a ways.”

Dr. DeCounter (13-2) won games of 4-2 and 5-3 before rallying to defeat Mountain Dew (9-6) for the title.

Game was much like the others this year, Wells said. After falling behind 2-1 on a two-run home run by Mountain Dew, his team scratched for runs, the top two batters in the order, Hunter Wells and Davis, got on base and eventually scored. The duo batted .568 and .563 for the year. “We scored 14 runs in the playoffs and they scored 10,” Wells said.

The pair, along with Carson Driskill and Bergman, provided a stout pitching quartet.

Knocking them in, usually, was coach Harrison Wells. He hit .421 with a team high 20 RBIs.

Dr. DeCounter was a melding of two groups of players, most of whom have been together at least four years. The 9- and 10-year-olds join up every even year. They include Justin Clifford, Jacob Dye, Shawn Fay, Austin Flynn, Austin Luhn, Mitchell Nelson and Luca Capobianchi.

Whatever next year brings, Ken Wells is the present.

“This was a very fun group to coach,” he said. “I thought we’d do OK because I knew our pitching would be pretty good.”

Winning the championship, he added, was a bonus.

“I told the kids, this is special, don’t take it for granted,” said Wells. “You don’t win too many championships in a lifetime.”

But with the Eagle legacy, don’t bet against them.

Pair fourth at Junior Olympics

Two Valley athletes placed fourth in their specialties during USA Track and Field National Junior Olympics last weekend in Eugene, Ore.

Melissa Mauro of the Spokane Stealth team cleared 5-foot-3 in the Youth Girls high jump, and Dana McClendon of Spokane Valley Track threw 42-0 ¾ for fourth in the shot put.

In addition, Evie Baker from Stealth put 39-10 ¾ to place eighth.

Tara Lucas, also of Youth Girls, and Jon Jeffreys, Young Men, missed medaling in the javelin, finishing ninth and 11th respectively in their age groups.