MARYSVILLE — Each of the previous four years, the Marysville Pilchuck baseball program suffered the heartbreak of falling one win short of the state tournament.
Last season ended in particularly agonizing fashion, with the Tomahawks blowing a seventh-inning lead in a winner-to-state elimination game.
This year’s senior-laden Marysville Pilchuck squad was determined to end the string of near-misses.
“We didn’t like that taste,” Tomahawks senior Jordan Luton said. “We knew we had to get it done in the weight room, get stronger and get better with our swings. And we just (had) to trust each other more to get jobs done.”
Fueled by last year’s heartbreak and a close-knit bond among the team’s 12 seniors, Marysville Pilchuck broke through and reached state in decisive fashion.
The Tomahawks steamrolled through the Class 3A Northwest District tournament last week with sizzling bats and shutdown pitching, outscoring their three opponents by a combined 29-1 margin.
That included a 9-1 semifinal win over Meadowdale to clinch the program’s first state berth since 2009, followed by an 11-0 mercy-rule rout of state-bound Edmonds-Woodway in the district title game.
“It was really hard the last couple of years just coming up short and having that gut feeling of failure,” Marysville Pilchuck senior Colby Phelps said. “When you’re that close, it just rips your heart out of your chest. You want it so bad.
“But once you get there — where we’re at now — it’s the best feeling.”
The Tomahawks (19-4) are riding an 11-game winning streak heading into Saturday’s 3A state regional contest against Bonney Lake (20-5), which is scheduled for 1 p.m. at Sherman Anderson Field in Mount Vernon. With a victory, Marysville Pilchuck would face the Arlington-Eastside Catholic winner later in the afternoon for a chance at the program’s first state semifinal berth since 1983.
The success-filled season is the culmination of a four-year journey for coach James Day and the Tomahawks’ seniors, most of whom played under Day as freshmen and sophomores when he was the junior-varsity coach. The bulk of those players transitioned to varsity last season, the same year Day took the varsity head-coaching job.
“I’ve had all my boys for four years now, and it’s great to see them perform how I truly thought that (one day) they’d perform,” Day said.
The biggest difference from last season has been Marysville Pilchuck’s massive improvement at the plate.
The Tomahawks average 8.5 runs per game, an increase of nearly three runs per contest from last year. Marysville Pilchuck also upped its team batting average from .272 to .337, and its extra-base hits from 31 to 46.
Five Tomahawks are batting above .375 this season: Eric Anderson (.419), Phelps (.411), Luton (.406), Coby Nelson (.393) and Baily Alvis (.377). Last year, only one of those five players hit above .265, and no Marysville Pilchuck starter hit above .345.
Furthermore, the Tomahawks don’t have a weak spot in their lineup, as evidenced by the bottom third of the order’s recent success. In their last two district-tournament games, Mark Bielawski, Nelson and Kee-An Ballard went a combined 10-for-18 with five extra-base hits.
“The top half kind of sets a tone for the bottom half,” Day said. “The bottom half (then) gets on base, and now the top half comes back around. It makes really fun baseball.”
“If I was a pitcher, I wouldn’t throw to any one of (us),” Luton said. “It’s just all the work we’ve been (doing) in the batting cages and the weight room.”
Anderson, a senior who plans to continue his career at Bellevue College, said he and Luton hit in the cages four times a week during this past offseason. Anderson also was one of several players who took it upon themselves to lift weights at 6 a.m. three mornings a week throughout the fall and winter, taking advantage of the school’s new athletic trainer.
“We’ve had guys gain 18, 20 pounds of lean muscle,” said Day, a 2004 Marysville Pilchuck graduate who played baseball for the Tomahawks.
Day and several players also attributed the hitting gains to more team-centered approaches at the plate. Instead of swinging for the fences, the Tomahawks are focused on hitting the ball hard and keeping the lineup rolling.
“We worked on our approach a lot, knowing that not one of us is going to win a game (alone),” Luton said.
“Instead of trying to be so pull-heavy,” Anderson added, “I just started to (focus on) driving the ball over the second baseman’s head every at-bat. … Guys are trying to drive the ball gap to gap instead of trying to put it over the fence.”
Marysville Pilchuck’s pitching also has made strides from last season, cutting its runs allowed from 4.5 to 3.8 per game. The Tomahawks’ arms have been particularly impressive as of late, allowing only one run combined over their past four games.
Anderson, a tall righty, has struck out 52 batters and walked nine while posting a 0.58 earned-run average in 48 2/3 innings pitched this season. Lefty senior Tyler Devries has a 1.47 ERA in 28 2/3 innings.
“We’re blessed with pitching this year,” Day said. “I haven’t even used half of my guys who can pitch, (or who) probably could go on to pitch in some sort of college situation. … The big thing is just pounding the zone (and) throwing strikes.”
Day and several players also pointed to a closer bond among this group of seniors than in years past.
“This year, I think we really came together as a team,” Anderson said. “We’re more than just teammates. We’re brothers, we’re friends, we’re family.”
“This senior class is something real amazing,” Day added. “From freshman year on, they’ve really experienced a lot of different life-changing events. And for them to look forward and look past that … and want to strive and do great things, it’s something really special.”
And now they’re two wins away from matching school history.
“That would probably be the best moment in my life,” Anderson said of reaching the state semifinals. “Doing it with this group of guys, it would mean a lot.”
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