Gig Harbor baseball eyeing third consecutive league title

After starting the Class 3A South Sound Conference schedule with a 1-4 record a season ago, things were looking bleak for the Gig Harbor High School baseball team.

Then the Tides won nine league games in a row to finish the regular season, claiming the league title in the process.

Call it a reminder to the rest of the league: The SSC goes through Gig Harbor.

“Last year, we got off to a bit of a rough start,” said senior designated hitter Sebastian Toglia. “But we weren’t worried, we knew we had a deep lineup, really good pitching.”

Gig Harbor has won the past three league titles — two in the SSC, and the year before in the Class 4A Narrows League, before Gig Harbor dropped down to 3A. The Tides are aiming to do it again.

“We have full intentions of keeping that tradition going,” Toglia said. “We know this is our league. We know we’re the best team out here. We want to just come out and take it. We’ve got the skills, depth and everything. We know we can do it.”

Gig Harbor won the 3A state title in 2017 and earned another state tournament appearance in 2018, before losing to Kelso in the opening round.

“You kind of have that expectation as Gig Harbor baseball,” said pitcher Grant Hassan. “You’ve got to win league, go far into playoffs. It’s a competitive league. Peninsula has a lot of good, young talent. Timberline, Capital, those are all good squads. We’re going to have to step up our game, make sure our arms are healthy and be ready for the long stretch.”

Gig Harbor returns plenty of talent from last year’s roster, but lost starting pitcher Austin Dempewolf (Portland) and hitting-machine Jordan Haworth (PLU), last year’s SSC 3A MVP, who hit .420 for the Tides.

“I think our lineup is way different than last year,” said junior pitcher and first baseman Owen Wild. “Last year, I don’t think we were as solid one through nine. (Haworth) hit almost .500. This year, one through nine, I think everyone on the team can hit pretty well.”

Wild takes over as the team’s No. 1 pitcher, adding to his three-pitch arsenal (fastball, changeup, curveball) a slider that he’s been developing during the offseason.

“That’s been getting a lot of swing and misses for me,” Wild said. “It looks like a fastball coming out of the hand.”

Gig Harbor went 2-2 in non-league play in March, with wins coming over Wilson and Bellevue, and losses in the first two games of the season to Bellarmine Prep and Bainbridge.

“We know if we play our best, we’re going to win a lot of ball games,” Toglia said. “So after starting out 0-2, we weren’t worried. We know we have a lot of depth and we want to go far.”

With Wild, along with No. 2 pitcher Max Sparrow, Hassan and others, Gig Harbor should have one of the league’s best rotations.

“We can really throw in any of our pitchers and we have confidence in them,” Hassan said. “That’s a really good thing to have, especially come later in the season, when those games start piling up.”

And while Gig Harbor is unlikely to find a .420 hitter again this season, the Tides feel good about the depth of the lineup this season.

“We have a lot of consistency,” Hassan said. “We’re not like those teams loaded with D1 prospects. We have a lot of good teammates, people that just know how to do their job in any situation.”