EDMONDS — Six batters into Monday’s game, Edmonds-Woodway pitcher Patrick Bernard had given up three singles, a long flyout to the fence in center field, a hit batter and two balks, and the sum total was two runs in and two runners on for Marysville Pilchuck.
No question, a bad case of playoff jitters.
But with the visiting Tomahawks on the verge of seizing a big early lead, Bernard got the third out of the inning and from there settled into a nice rhythm to help Edmonds-Woodway to an 8-6 district playoff victory. The outcome wraps up a state tournament spot and puts the Warriors into Thursday night’s district title game.
“I started off kind of shaky,” Bernard admitted. “I was a little nervous (in the first inning), but after that I settled down and really started commanding better.”
Knowing what was at stake, he added, “I’d do anything to win this game. It clinches a state berth, so you always want to win a game like this.”
After that rocky start, Bernard held Marysville Pilchuck hitless and scoreless until the fifth inning, when a leadoff walk came around to score. He left in the sixth with the Tomahawks in the middle of a three-run rally, but reliever Jorgen Arneson ended the threat and then pitched a scoreless seventh.
Offensively, the Warriors shrugged off the early 2-0 deficit with a four-run first inning, putting seven of the team’s first eight batters on base safely. Edmonds-Woodway added a single run in the second, two in the fourth and another in the fifth.
In all, the Warriors pounded out 10 hits — all in the first four innings — and added eight more baserunners with seven walks and a hit batter.
“One through nine (in the batting order), this is one of my best offensive teams,” said Edmonds-Woodway coach Dan Somoza, who is in his fourth season. Previous teams had more power, he added, “but this team gets more walks vs. strikeouts. This team controls the plate a little more.”
Every player in the lineup “puts the ball in play,” said Warriors first baseman/pitcher Ryan Budnick. “Everybody sprays it all over the field and everybody’s always on base. So I’d say we can handle anybody. Whoever (the opponents) throw, we’re going to hit them.”
Marysville Pilchuck, meanwhile, was came away regretting several missed scoring chances. The Tomahawks scored once in the fifth and three in the sixth, and could easily have scored more in those innings except for a baserunning out in each.
For the Tomahawks, though, one of the most unfortunate breaks came in the sixth. With the bases loaded and Edmonds-Woodway leading 8-4, Marysville Pilchuck cleanup hitter Brandon Dormaier crushed a ball to straightaway center field that would have been a home run — and on this day, a game-tying grand slam home run — in almost any other ballpark.
Except the ball struck the towering outfield net, which is designed to prevent cheap homers over the shallow center field fence. It ended up being a two-RBI single, and they were the last runs the Tomahawks scored.
“It is what it is and we knew that coming in,” said Marysville Pilchuck coach Kurt Koshelnik with a wry smile. “(The Warriors) put a couple of balls off the net, too.”
“(The net) changes the whole game around,” Somoza said. “And it’s a good home-field advantage for us because we know how to play it. … We hit a couple of balls into the net that would’ve been home runs, too. So in a sense, it all works out.”
Edmonds-Woodway advances to face Lake Stevens in the district championship game at 7 p.m. Thursday at Everett Memorial Stadium. The Warriors lost to Jackson in the title game a year ago, “and it leaves bad taste in your mouth,” Bernard said. “So we want it real bad this year.”
Marysville Pilchuck can still reach the state playoffs, but must first win a few more games, beginning with a 4 p.m. loser-out home game today against rival Snohomish.
“It’s definitely a harder road,” Koshelnik said. “This would’ve been a nice one to get, but we got outplayed today by a really good Edmonds-Woodway team. So now we have a couple of extra games on our schedule. But as I tried to sell it to my kids, it’s just more baseball.”
At Edmonds-Woodway H.S.
Marysville Pilchuck 200 013 0—6 9 0
Edmonds-Woodway 410 210 x—8 10 1
Luton, Anderson (2) and Walker; Bernard, Arneson (6) and T. Budnick. WP_Bernard. LP—Luton. 2B_Hopstad (MP), Hull (EW), Arneson (EW). Records—Marysville Pilchuck is 14-7, Edmonds-Woodway is 17-5.
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