Warriors come up short at district tourney

Published 11:47 am Thursday, May 15, 2008

EVERETT

The Edmonds-Woodway baseball team finished the season strongly, just missing out on a state regional playoff berth. Snohomish edged the Warriors 6-4 to take the third place at the 4A District 1 tournament May 10 at Everett Memorial Stadium. The Panthers claimed the district’s third and final berth to the state tournament.

After a somewhat up-and-down regular season and losing 13-0 to Snohomish in a first-round district tournament game, Edmonds-Woodway put together back-to-back wins over Jackson and Shorewood before being eliminated.

“I told them that I was really proud of the way they played this week,” Edmonds-Woodway coach Matt Barker said of his players.

He noted that the Warriors finished the regular season 11-9 and just sneaked into the playoffs.

“We felt we were better than that,” Barker said. “Everyone, including the players and myself, were kind of a little disappointed in how inconsistent we were during the year. But then we cranked it up this week.”

Barker told his players that after the loss to Snohomish it would have been easy for them to pack it in and go home.

“We didn’t do that,” Barker said. “We came back and beat two good teams to get to today. We beat Jackson and then Shorewood, two teams that finished ahead of us in the regular season. So that was nice.

“We battled. That’s all you can do – get in the district tournament and try to make a little bit of a run.”

Edmonds-Woodway had its share of opportunities against Snohomish but didn’t have the key hit to sustain a significant rally. The Warriors had runners in scoring position in all but the first inning.

“We never really got that big hit,” Barker said. “We had two innings end via strikeout and one inning end via double play with the bases loaded. It was one of those games. We didn’t play particularly poorly, but they just played a little better than us. I think four of their runs were a direct result of our mistakes.”

Snohomish took a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning, but Edmonds-Woodway limited the damage by cutting down a runner from third who was trying to score during a steal attempt by a runner on first base.

Edmonds-Woodway senior Joel Bettiger led off the third inning with a home run. Senior Adam Hutt later followed with a two-out single and then scored when Snohomish’s rightfielder misplayed a single by senior Kramer Scott as the Warriors tied the score at 2. The Panthers retook the lead in the fourth by pushing across two runs.

Edmonds-Woodway responded with a run in the fifth. Senior Tyler Cox doubled to score Scott, who drew a two-out walk.

The Panthers then took advantage of two walks in the fifth, scoring two more runs to take a 6-3 lead. The Panthers took advantage of a throwing error on a potential double play ball.

“The few mistakes we did make were very critical,” Barker said. “There weren’t that many of them, but they hurt.”

The Warriors scored its final run in the sixth when senior Tyler Lange hit a single, advanced to second on a wild pitch and then scored on a throwing error.

Edmonds-Woodway (13-11) had two runners on base in the seventh but could not advance anyone beyond second base.