Young Roadrunner Squad Looks Good In River Valley Tournament

By Greg Perkins
   The Roadrunners may have only picked up one win, their first of the season, at the River Valley Tournament over the weekend, but Coach Shawn Layden feels his squad is on the verge of being a good team.
   “With the exception of a couple of games, I felt that we are really starting to come together as a team. Our overall attitude and team spirit seem to be picking up and now we need to start winning some games. We are really a very young team, with several of our players seeing their first quality time on the varsity field. Once we can come together, I feel we will have a good squad when we head to region play,” said the coach.
   Holbrook opened the tournament on Thursday afternoon facing Spring Creek, and was shut out 8-0. The Birds had just three hits in the game, coming from Marcus Castillo, Gabi Aguilera and Joey Aguilera. They left five runners on base and had two errors.
   On Friday they faced a very good Chino Valley team and played well before a couple of ill timed errors cost them a one run loss at 3-2. Leading 2-1 in the sixth inning the Roadrunners had a couple of throwing errors, which allowed Chino Valley to come away with the win.
   “We really played well in this game, and probably should have won it,” said Coach Layden. “We made two big errors late in the game which gave them an opportunity, and they are a good enough team to take advantage and they got the job done. They have been pounding teams so far this season, winning most of their games by the 10-run rule, but we played them tough.”
   In their second game on Friday, they took down Needles, Calif., by a final of 10-5. Things looked bad early on as Needles scored four runs in the top of the first, but Holbrook countered with five runs in the bottom of the inning, then pulled away in the later innings to get the win. Brian Hansen came on in relief in the second inning and pitched a no hitter from that point on. He worked 42/3 innings of hitless ball.
   Holbrook scored 10 runs on 10 hits and made three errors. Needles scored five runs on four hits and had one error.
   On Saturday morning Holbrook faced West Wendover, Nev., and battled hard before losing a 2-1 decision. The Birds scored the game’s first run in the third inning and held that lead until the sixth when they made some crucial errors which led to the loss. Gabi Aguilera pitched very well and had a no hitter going through five innings, but in the sixth some hits coupled with some errors helped to give the Birds the loss.
   “We had several opportunities to score some runs early in this game, which could have given us a big lead, but our inability to score with the bases loaded and no outs really came back to haunt us,” noted Coach Layden.
   In their final game of the tournament the Roadrunners played a very good Elko, Nev., team and again played well before taking the 9-6 loss. This game was close through the first three innings. Both teams scored twice in the opening inning, then Holbrook went up 4-3 after two. In the third Elko came back with three runs, but the Birds scored twice and sent the game to the fourth inning tied at 6-6. That tie was broken in the fifth inning when Elko pushed in three runs to secure the 9-6 win.
   “Once again, we played well at times in this game. We have some good young kids coming up, and I feel that we will get this thing turned around soon. One of many bright spots for Holbrook was freshman Javier Quintana, who pitched three perfect innings over the weekend, striking out all nine of the batters he faced in those three innings of work,” said the coach.
   After playing at Round Valley on Tuesday, the Roadrunners, who are now 1-8, will take some time off for spring break before returning to action on Friday, March 27, when they host Snowflake. The next day they will host Payson in a doubleheader.