High school baseball: Mountain Crest, Snow Canyon claim 4A winners bracket games

The Mountain Crest Mustangs and Snow Canyon Warriors each picked up wins for the second consecutive day on Tuesday, this time taking down the Bear River Bears and Ridgeline RiverHawks, respectively, as they advanced to the semifinal round of the 4A state baseball tournament.

The Mustangs won a 9-8 thriller behind another strong third inning, scoring five runs to match their output on Monday.

When asked about what lets his team capitalize in the middle of games, Mountain Crest coach Steve Hansen said, “Our second time through the order we have learned some things from our first at-bats. We go up there a little more focused up. Today we needed to score runs because we knew Bear River could score runs, so we had to match that early.”

Bear River fought back and had the lead down to two runs in the fourth and the ball in the air towards right field. Braydon Schiess made a terrific catch and started a relay through Dax Roundy to Hudson Phelps, getting the rounding runner from third out at the plate to end the inning and keep momentum on their side.

The Bears also appeared to tie the game late, but a runner interference was called bringing the run back out of the dugout. Strong relief pitching followed and the Mustangs escaped with the win.

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Snow Canyon also picked up a victory on its path to the championship series, topping the RiverHawks 6-0. Isaac Lyon outlasted Cam Bott in a low-scoring affair between two great pitchers that saw just one run through the first four and a half innings (the Warriors were able to score on a passed ball in the bottom half of the second).

Lyon would pitch a full seven innings, allowing just two hits and no runs in a dominating performance.

“Nine strikeouts, one walk. We have talked about it all year, throw strikes and let your defense play behind you and that is what he did,” Snow Canyon coach Reed Secrist said of Lyon’s performance.

Even with a great pitching performance, a complete game shutout isn’t possible without some key impact plays from positional players.

“I left a fastball up and they murdered it to right and Sam Lindsey saved a triple and eventually a run, Landon Frei made a tough play, a slow roller he had to throw on the run. Same with Mayze Mosher and Tanner Truman, a big credit to them. The whole defense played solid for me in a great team win,” Lyon said.

Snow Canyon finally broke the game open, scoring two runs in the fifth inning and three in the sixth.

With their triumphs, the Mustangs and Warriors move to within one win of this weekend’s championship series. Each team will have two opportunities to take down their respective challenger from the one-loss brackets.

The first chance will come on Wednesday night after a pair of one-loss games in the morning. If they can’t prevail there, a matchup will take place on Thursday to decide which team makes the state championship.

The further into the tournament, the shallower pitching rotations become and an off day could play a large role in who’s available over the weekend.

“We got to come tomorrow and play the game in hand. We will come battle tomorrow and a win would be great but we are just going to play the best baseball we can,” Hansen said.