Experience and tradition don’t seem to be of much use for the West Plains Wolves when it comes to athletics in 2024-25.
That was (or wasn’t) on display Friday afternoon at West Plains when the Wolves hosted Canyon in a game which figured to decide the District 4-4A baseball championship. Regardless, it established the budding rivalry between the Canyon ISD schools which is only getting started.
This time, in a rematch between two teams tied for the district lead with only two games left in the regular season, the past meant little. West Plains took the early lead and never looked back, rolling to an 8-1 victory to take sole possession of the district lead and grab the inside track on a district championship.
That’s pretty heady territory for a program which is only in its third year of existence.
“At the end of the day I’m just proud of our guys for coming in here day in and day out and finding a way to continue to grind out wins,” West Plains coach Colby Chandler said. “That’s just been our motto all year, anyone, any time, any place. These guys embrace that the next game is the most important game. We do have a chance to make some history and win that first district championship.”
It seemed preordained that these two teams would meet again with a district crown on the line. In their first meet at Canyon, West Plains (21-5-1, 11-1) rallied to tie the game with four runs in the top of the seventh before the Eagles (22-4, 10-2) mounted a two-out rally of their own in the bottom of the inning to pull out an 8-7 win.
There were no such dramatics this time, as the Wolves jumped on top early and kept going. With one out in the bottom of the first, they loaded the bases with three straight singles off Canyon starter Zabien Urteaga.
After Urteaga struck out Elijah Velasquez looking, starting pitcher Reid Macon came to the plate for West Plains. Macon lined a two-run single to left to give the Wolves a 2-0 lead and set the tone for the rest of the game.
“We always talk about passing it off to the next player and Elijah passed me the bat and I thought ‘Let’s score these runs,'” said Macon, who drove in three runs. “We have that confidence knowing you’re up in the game and have a little wiggle room if you make some errors and today we just bonded as a team and played together.”
Macon did give up a run in the second when Canyon’s Bayler Schilling drove in a run on a groundout to cut the lead to 2-1. In the bottom of the third, Macon hit a sacrifice fly to build the lead back to 3-1, but wasn’t called out to pitch the fourth.
Chandler sent out Noah Vasquez, who has also been a starter this season and was a closer against Canyon, finishing the game by throwing four scoreless innings.
“We had everybody in our dugout available to throw today and we were going to do what it takes to win,” Chandler said. “Reid did his job and came in and gave us a quality start and with Noah it was a feel thing. He was throwing so well and just executing pitches. Ultimately it’s hard to go away from that.”
Vasquez rewarded Chandler’s decision by not allowing a runner past second base. Appropriately, he concluded the game by pitching a 1-2-3 seventh, the only frame of the game where either team didn’t allow a baserunner.
“I knew I’d come in eventually and when I did come in I wanted to stick with my stuff,” Vasquez said. “I just had to get outs. When I pitch I just want to throw strikes and if it works out it works out. We came in with a lot of energy and no one was going to stop us today.”
West Plains put the game away with three runs in the fourth to knock out Urteaga. Kane White-Tinsley got things started with a triple and scored on Kaden Hooker’s single and after Hooker stole two bases, he scored on a sacrifice fly by Jesse Flores en route to a 6-1 lead.
Later in that inning, Boston Ladd would single and score all the wat from second base on Alakai Carrillo’s groundout. That was a symbol the the resourcefulness of the Wolves, as they concluded their scoring with two runs in the fifth without the benefit of a base hit, as West Plains took advantage of four Canyon errors.
The good news for the Eagles is that they and the Wolves both clinched playoff spots prior to the game, and can use next week’s last two games to tune up for the postseason.
“We made some errors on what we thought should have been routine plays,” Canyon coach Jed Anderson said. “(The Wolves) are a good ball club and you can’t give any team like that any extra outs. They did a good job of putting the ball in play and pressuring us.”