Olympia baseball tops 4A SPSL rival Puyallup in 4A district championship
Trace Pruitt bounced off the mound at Art Wright Field in Kent and pumped his right fist, the emotion of the moment caught in five seconds. Pruitt had just induced a fly ball to left field with Puyallup runners at second and third that ended a Vikings rally in the fifth inning of the Class 4A West Central/Southwest district championship game.
“I think it was Kai, too,” Pruitt said. “It’s just competing and the emotions get to you. It’s a tight rivalry. We see them at least three times every year.”
It was indeed Puyallup’s No. 3 hitter, catcher Kai Halstead, who had reached base five of his first six times at the plate during the district semifinals and championship game. But with Olympia clinging to a 2-1 lead that eventually became the final, Pruitt got Halstead to fly out.
An inning later, now playing shortstop, Pruitt went to a knee and snared a hard-hit ball off the bat of Mason Pike in the hole, then started a 6-4-3 double play to quell a potential sixth-inning uprising before it could get started. The Vikings (21-3) put two on with two outs in the seventh, as well, but Riley Snow struck out Jackson Copeland to end things and give Olympia (18-3) a district title.
“If you tell me before the game, you’ll give up two runs, I’ll tell you we are going to win the game,” Puyallup coach Marc Wiese said. “On top of it, I thought we hit some balls really really well right at them. In the outfield, we were a little more unlucky. You need to be good and a little lucky. I’m OK with us being a little unlucky in this game.”
Pruitt had allowed Puyallup’s only run of the game in that fifth inning, immediately after the Bears had finally broken a scoreless tie when Evan Nicol doubled down the left field line to score Lincoln Berg and Jack Skelley followed with a safety squeeze to drive in Pruitt to take a 2-0 lead in the top of the fifth.
Prior to that, Vikings starter Michael LeJeune had flirted with disaster early but kept the game in check. LeJeune gave up two hits, walked three and threw three wild pitches in the first two innings but somehow managed to keep Olympia off the scoreboard.
That meant Pruitt needed the same kind of stellar performance for Olympia, and he delivered.
“I’m just going to have to keep dealing on the mound,” Pruitt said. “It’s a tough pitcher. He’s very good. But we’re going to get him eventually.”
This is the second consecutive season Olympia has bested Puyallup in the district title game after winning last season’s meeting, 8-4.
A year ago, the final meeting of the season between these 4A South Puget Sound League rivals happened two weeks later in the season, but it also was for a title — the state title. In a much higher-scoring, but still as close a game, Olympia won the championship, 7-6.
“We prepare for pressure, and we feel like it brings the best out in us,” Olympia coach Derrick Weldon said. “It’s the 10th time we’ve played them in the last three years. It’s a fun competition. I hope we have a chance to see each other again. If that happens, then we are where we want to be.”
Likely again playing for the 4A state title in two weeks. First, though, both teams must get through the Round of 16 and quarterfinals that will be played this coming Saturday. Teams will find out on Sunday who they play in the opening round.