Glacier all-stars go 0-4 at regional tournament

It was like the movie Ground Hog Day for the Glacier 14-year-old Babe Ruth all-star team at the regional tournament last week in Moscow, Idaho. The next day was a carbon copy of the day before.

Suffering from fielding and mental mistakes and pitching control problems, Glacier was drubbed 20-5 by Southern Washington in the pool play opener Aug. 3 and lost to Alberta 15-4 the next day.

Fielding woes continued Thursday as Glacier was defeated by the host Latah team from Moscow, 9-6. After a scheduled day off Thursday and a Friday rainout, Glacier's appearance in the regional tourney ended Saturday with a 15-9 loss to a Coos Bay/North Bend team.

Only the top two teams in each pool advanced to single-elimination bracket play Saturday evening.

"We did a lot better than we did in the first two," Glacier manager Eric May said of the games against Moscow and Coos Bay/North Bend. "Both were good games until the very end."

Glacier could not fully take advantage of winning the coin flip for home team in all four games as the team's opponents all got off to early leads.

"There were a lot of innings when we had two outs and we'd have an error," May said. "Your pitchers are throwing more pitches. You can't give them four or five outs an inning. That's what we did all week."

Glacier fell behind Moscow in the first couple of innings.

"They got out on us right away," May said of the loss to Moscow, which had strong support from its fans."

Glacier fought back to tie the game in the fourth inning. Moscow led by two after six and added a run in the top of the seventh. Glacier failed to score in the bottom half of the frame.

May said Cooper Olson was the top hitter for Glacier in the tournament; he had two hits in the Moscow game.

"Our bats were pretty silent," the coach said. "Their (Moscow's' pitchers were phenomenal.

"Our 2-3-4 batters had only five or six hits all week," he added.

When Glacier had runners on base, most often they could not capitalize as three runners were picked off by Moscow pitchers. "We had baserunning mistakes all week long," May said.

Jace Kalbfleisch started on the mound for Glacier. He was relieved by Jake May, who pitched four good innings. Nick LaGrandeur pitched the seventh inning.

In defense of the Glacier pitchers, seven of the nine Moscow runs were unearned.

ERIC MAY said a couple of teams that had gone winless in their first three pool play games went home early, but Glacier did not.

"We could have gone home. The kids wanted to stay," May said.

Saturday's game against Coos Bay/North Bend was knotted 4-4 after five innings, but the Oregon team erupted for nine runs in the top of the sixth.

"The sixth inning was ugly. We had a lot of errors and a lot of walks," May said. "When you have a lot of 2-0, 3-1 counts they just sit back and drive the ball against you."

Glacier responded, scoring a run in the sixth. They scored four more in the last of the seventh, but left the bases loaded as the game ended.

"We never did give up. It was a good, valiant comeback. We were always enthusiastic in the seventh inning," May said.

Glacier had only five hits, two each by May and Olson. Peter Seymour had the other hit.

LaGrandeur pitched well in the first four innings, according to Eric May. Seymour, Austin Martin and Nick LaFontaine all pitched in the sixth.

Coos Bay/North Bend's big sixth inning was reminiscent of all four games in the tourney for Glacier.

"It told the tale of the whole weekend. We had just one bad inning that got away from us," May said, and the Glacier players learned from their mistakes. "It was a good experience. They know what it's going to take at that level."

This group of players have been to the regional tournament three of the last four years, and that goes to show the quality of players on the squad.

"We had glimpses of our normal play. We never had the entire game putting it together from the first inning to the last," May said.