Tiger JV baseball team wins District III 4A tourney

The Mountain Home Tigers JV baseball team capped off a successful season by winning the District III 4A JV baseball tourney played last week in Mountain Home.

Tigers JV 6

B.K. JV 2

After opening the District Tournament with a 13-3 win over Kuna, the Tigers faced Bishop Kelly in the semi-finals last Monday, and got good pitching and timely hitting to down the Knights, 6-2.

Eric Christiansen went the distance for the win, striking out nine batters. Ricky Baker and Tom Hennessey both had two hits, Hennessey had two RBIs. Eric Christiansen, Trevor Woodruff and Chris Maholick each had a hit, Maholick knocked in two runs.

Shawn Lewis and Adam Carter had RBIs.

"The guys came out fired up and Eric threw a heck of a game," said Tiger JV baseball coach Mark Cotton. "He only gave up two hits and had a no-no going into the fifth, and worked ahead in the count, and that's something he has struggled with this year, and I definitely think he saw the results that when you work ahead in the count, good things happen.

"We hit the ball well situationally. We'd get runners on and we'd find a way to get them across, and that's all you can ask for in those games, and we kept our errors to a minimum. Hopefully, we can take this momentum into tomorrow against Emmett and keep the same intensity and come out with a district championship."

Tiger JV 7

Emmett JV 5

(8 innings)

The Mountain Home Tigers captured the JV Championship Tuesday evening, battling from behind to force extra innings, and then scoring twice in the eighth inning to beat Emmett, 7-5, for the JV district championship.

Single runs in the first and third innings put the Tigers up 2-0, but a four-run sixth gave Emmett a 5-2 lead.

Mountain Home battled back in the top of the seventh to tie the game at 5-5.

In the bottom of the seventh Emmett led off the inning with a triple. Coach Cotton had his pitcher, Adam Carter, walk the next two batters to load the bases. Carter then got three straight ground balls for outs, the first two going home to get force outs, and the third to end the inning.

"It seems like that never works when you do that," said Coach Cotton with a chuckle. "It seems like somebody gets a little squeaker that gets through, or a little blooper that falls in, but Adam Carter did a great job on the mound. He got two ground balls and got both the outs at home, and then got another ground ball to get the out at first, so the kids just focused up when they had to."

In the top of the eighth, Mountain Home scored two runs to take the lead, 7-5, and Adam Carter shut the Huskies down in the eighth for the win.

"We had big hits by Chris Maholick and Logan Monasterio when we needed it," said Coach Cotton. "Those guys have been struggling all season, but when it came down to crunch time, they did what the had to do, and that was a big part of the victory."

Ricky Baker and Eric Christiansen both had two hits, Shawn Lewis, Tom Hennessey, Gabe Anderson, Logan Monasterio, Adam Carter and Chris Maholick all had hits, Hennessey, Monasterio and Carter had RBIs.

Carter blanked the Huskies the final two innings to pick up the win.

The JV Tigers finished the season with a 17-6 overall record -- that after an 0-4 start.

"We started out the season with Timberline and BK and Emmett, and Emmett finished the regular season 15-1," said Cotton. "We started out with a really tough schedule, so I think we were better for that, to face that good competition early in the season, and as the season went on, we started limiting errors, and hitting was a big problem early in the season, and that came along as the season went along. The kids worked hard for it, and I'm proud of them."