By Keeghan Gittins
For The New Era
Sweet Home went 1-2 in a series with North Marion last week, but then saw that win turn into a forfeit loss in the first game to make that 0-3, sending it to the Oregon West Conference baseball cellar with this week left in the regular season.
The Huskies were 2-10 in OWC action, 7-16 overall, going into this week, while North Marion moved into a third-place tie with Stayton (5-7) in the league standings. Cascade started the week one game ahead of Sweet Home, at 3-9.
Sweet Home 12, North Marion 6 (Forfeit)
Things seemingly started off good for Sweet Home as, in the teams’ first matchup Monday, May 5, at North Marion, Sweet Home came away with a 12-6 victory – that turned into a defeat.
“We did have a winning result on Monday, but we had to forfeit due to a pitch count error, Coach Evan Teter explained.
The Huskies started the game down 2-0, but going into the second, they went on a seven-run rally that broke the game wide open. North Marion was never able to regain the lead.
Sweet Home started the second inning hitting six straight singles. Tregon Francis topped it off with a double, scoring the seventh run. This was Francis’s eleventh double of the season; the next closest is Luke Rosa with eight.
Rosa led the team with three RBIs and had his second triple of the year; the only Husky with more than one.
Sweet Home had a great day at the plate, getting 17 hits. Connor Northern had three by himself — also adding two runs and two RBIs.
“Conner continued to have a good batting series, having an average of .500, and Luke had four RBIs, with a triple, in the series,” Teter said.
Four players took the mound for Sweet Home, Lynkin Royer and Rosa pitching the most, with five innings between them. Royer only let up one run while both pitchers retired two batters each.
North Marion 16, Sweet Home 3
At home on Wednesday, Sweet Home did not fare so well, losing 16-3.
North Marion jumped out to a 5-0 lead entering the bottom of the second, and the hosts could only cut the lead to three.
Zajic started on the mound, pitching a solid four innings, striking out eight of the 24 batters he faced.
In the fifth and sixth inning, North Marion put the game out of reach with nine unanswered runs.
Eddie Taylor was the only Husky with more than one hit and had an RBI. Francis added another double to his resume, along with a run of his own.
North Marion 7, Sweet Home 1
Sweet Home was able to get on the board first in the third inning at North Marion with a Zajic RBI single, but the hosts were able to even it at one apiece.
The Huskies were unable to string together any more runs; they had the same amount of hits as North Marion, but just weren’t able to capitalize.
Royer started on the mound, pitching two innings, only letting up one run and having a strikeout. Rosa came in to relieve him, pitching a little more than three innings, gaining six strikeouts on 90 pitches.
Sweet Home takes on No. 14 Stayton in their final OWC series: Monday, May 12, at home, then on the road Wednesday, May 14. Thursday, May 15, will be Sweet Home’s Senior Night. All games start at 5 p.m.
“We enter this next series with nothing to lose,” Teter said. “We are hoping that the guys play loose and have some fun this week, no matter what results we get.
“I’m very proud of our guys this year. They entered the season with an outsiders’ expectation of maybe only pulling out a win or two, and made a postseason push. They found ways to be successful despite the roadblocks in their way.
“They have put in the work that will set us up for success for years to come. I’m excited to see how hard they work this offseason. We are able to return all of our starters next year and have a strong freshmen class coming up.”