Spanish Fork and Mountain Crest both took care of business Wednesday afternoon, capitalizing on Tuesday’s success and launching themselves into the 5A state championship series.
After Bountiful beat Springville 8-1, the Braves got their first shot at Spanish Fork in the semifinals. The Dons came out on top, earning a tight 3-1 victory that featured plenty of offense and defense. Despite only scoring four runs, the two teams combined to leave 19 batters on base in a matchup where every run was vital.
The first important play of the day for Spanish Fork came before the game started. The semifinal matchup overlapped with the school’s graduation ceremony so Brooklyn Pintar, J’Amy Davis, Oaklie Beckstrom, and Trinity Benson received diplomas in their cap and gowns right before the first pitch.
“I liked it better. It was special to me, it was really cool to be on the field with the other seniors and do it together,” Benson said. “It was all one big fun event that was just part of the moment.”
Once the game started, it was all softball for the home team. They quickly jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning thanks to a two-strike, two-out double hit to center field by Peyton Hall. Early on it appeared that Spanish Fork would have a big day offensively, but they were never quite able to get the hits when they needed him. Benson would bring home a run in the second inning via a bunt, but the Dons wouldn’t score again.
Instead, they had to rely on their defense. Spanish Fork entered the day having only allowed 40 runs all year, 20 runs fewer than the next closest team in the 5A classification. A large part of that success has been due to sophomore Avery Sapp, who pitched another complete game. Sapp finished this stage of the tournament with 17 innings pitched and just two runs allowed.
Bountiful threatened in the final frame. Livi Arona was the tying run and hit a double to put herself in scoring position. The next batter hit a grounder to third base and Hall made a great throw to record the final out of the game.
“You can just see the fight in Avery Sapp, she has so much fight out there and she dug down deep and knew it was time to really turn it on.” coach Natalie Jarvis said, praising the near flawless game from Hall.
For Spanish Fork, it is their 10th title game appearance over the last 11 seasons. They have won four championships in that span as well as six total since the turn of the century. None of the players on this year’s team has won a title, though, as they fell short in both 2018 and 2019 before last season got cancelled.
Bracket 2 saw Wasatch take down Farmington 6-4, setting up a rematch of Tuesday’s thriller against Mountain Ridge.
Once again, the Wasps came out firing, and recorded 10 plate appearances in the opening frame. Four different Wasatch players earned a RBI and the Wasps took a 4-0 lead, although they did leave the bases loaded after back-to-back outs.
The Sentinels responded immediately, however. They got one run across in the bottom of the first before swinging the game in their favor with a six-run second inning. Mountain Ridge didn’t have any extra base hits in the inning, but seven batters did get on base.
“Composure, that was the big thing. We emphasize don’t ride the roller coaster, there is going to be good plays, there is going to be bad plays but at the end of the day there is a lot of outs that need to be made. With our offense we feel like we are always in the game. They scored four runs in that first inning but we knew they had to get us out 21 times before we comeback.” coach Andre Ashton said.
The Mountain Ridge pitching staff has been dealing with some injuries and after the rough start, they brought in Ashlyn Webb to pitch the final six and two-third innings. Webb stepped up and controlled the game as she recorded the final 20 outs in just over 70 pitches.
Wasatch did fight back. Andrea Sweat hit two home runs: A three-run bomb in the fourth to cut the lead to two and two-run shot in the sixth to again cut the lead to just a pair of runs.
The Sentinels offense never slowed down, though, and every time Wasatch made a move, Mountain Ridge punched back. The Sentinels added two runs to their lead in the fourth inning and then a three-run long shot from Tasha Hokanson in the bottom of the sixth put the game away for good.
“For us it’s all on the bus. We will celebrate this win on the bus ride home and then tomorrow on the bus ride here, we come out and get ourselves hyped up so that we are energized and ready to go,” Kiley Avery said.
After their planned inaugural season got cut short to just three games, Mountain Ridge will appear in the title game for the first time in school history — in year one. The bout between the Dons and Sentinels should be a thrilling one. Mountain Ridge enters the series with the most runs scored of any team in the state, while Spanish Fork has allowed the second fewest, trailing only Riverton—the top-seed in 6A. The best-of-three series is scheduled to kick off at Natalie Jarvis field in Spanish Fork on Thursday afternoon, with Games 2 and 3 being played Friday.