EVERETT — It was do-or-die week for the Archbishop Murphy High School baseball team.
Three games against the defending Class 2A state champion Cedarcrest. Three wins required to snare an unlikely Cascade Conference championship.
Not only did the Wildcats pull it off, they barely broke a sweat in the process.
Archbishop Murphy finished off its final-week comeback in style on April 30, defeating the Red Wolves 14-4 to complete the sweep and claim the crown. The game was shortened to six innings by the 10-run rule.
“It was a hard way to do it,” Archbishop Murphy coach Stan Taloff said about winning the league title. “We had to win all three of them, but our guys played well. We put the ball in play and did what we needed to do. I’m really proud of them. They decided this is what they wanted to do, knew what they had to do, and they did it.”
The Wildcats came into the three-game series trailing the Red Wolves, who were undefeated in league play, by two games in the standings. Only a sweep would give Archbishop Murphy the title.
But the Wildcats didn’t just break out the brooms, they brought along mops, vacuums and any other household cleaning product they could find. Archbishop Murphy scored 14 runs in all three games, invoking the 10-run rule in each.
“That’s unreal,” Archbishop Murphy catcher Chris Peterson said about his team’s exploits this week. “I couldn’t ask for anything more.
“We had to come in and sweep, so we’ve been working hard all week,” Peterson added. “We’ve been looking forward to these games, we came out swinging and scored the runs we needed to get the job done.”
Archbishop Murphy (16-2 league, 16-3 overall) thus takes the top seed into the district tournament, which begins May 8 in Anacortes. Cedarcrest (15-3, 15-4) will be the No. 2 seed.
Friday’s deciding game at Roman Miler Field on the Archbishop Murphy campus was just a continuation of the previous two contests. The Wildcats scored early and often, taking advantage of early walks in the first and third innings to grab a 7-2 lead. Then they unleashed the bats later in the game, finishing with 15 hits total.
Archbishop Murphy flirted with a 10-run lead for three innings before Jacob Oster’s bases-loaded, two-out single in the bottom of the sixth finally ended the game.
Jon Varriano finished 3-for-4 with three RBI and Oster went 3-for-3 with three RBI to lead a Wildcats attack that was lethal all week. Archbishop Murphy pounded out 38 hits in the three games, 12 of which went for extra bases. The only difference Friday was the Wildcats didn’t hit any home runs after slugging five in the previous two games.
“The bats were on fire,” Taloff said. “They didn’t try to overdo anything, they just put the ball in play and that’s what we need to do. The long balls will take care of themselves.”
The Wildcats received an efficient effort from starting pitcher Levi MaVorhis. A sophomore who’s seen limited duty this season, MaVorhis kept the ball in play and let his defense do the work. He gave up eight hits — all singles — and didn’t walk a batter.
“He kept his pitch count down, he threw strikes, he changed speeds with both his curveball and with his straight change,” Taloff said of MaVorhis. “He kept them off-balance and did a great job, so it’s a great future for him.”
With the dominating performance this week, the Wildcats are brimming with confidence heading into the postseason.
“Our goal from the beginning of the year was to win the state championship,” Peterson said. “That’s what we’ve got our sights set on.”
Cedarcrest, meanwhile, must regroup for the postseason. The Red Wolves played the entire series without key batters Tommy Edwards and Jared Klingenberg because of injury. Edwards, who is recovering from a dislocated finger, may return in time for district. But Klingenberg, who recently underwent shoulder surgery, is out for good.
“They earned it,” Cedarcrest coach Scott Goldsberry said of the Wildcats. “Whether we’re down people or not they earned it, so congratulations to them.
“We need to get people healthy, that’s our big thing,” Goldsberry added. “If we get guys back healthy we’ll be much better than we are now. And our young guys saw significant time this week. They haven’t had that type of experience before, so we have to learn from it. If you’re a good team you use these things to get better. That’s just what we need to do.”
Daniel Porter was the lone Cedarcrest player with multiple hits. He finished 2-for-3 with an RBI.
Nick Patterson writes for The Herald.
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