_4/4 OC 9- North Canyon 2 Great job by our team to come out in the first and really do some damage. We put up 4 runs with 3 separate guys getting RBI's including Erickson, Sanborn and Saenz. We did a pretty good job of running bases all day. In the second inning we brought out the big sticks with Noah Kelly hitting a ball onto the school in left and Owen Sanborn almost reaching the same spot. So after 2 innings we were up 9-0. Not wanting to make it a short game we failed to score the rest of the way out. Andrew Hull threw a very good game, going 6 strong innings and Brendon Erickson was real good in his 1 inning of relief. Game Ball- Noah Kelly hit a homerun in his 3rd consecutive game. Alumni watch - Former booster club president Pat Carr was in attendance today. Good to see the ol' long neck bottle. Former Eagle Assistant Todd Bramble was in town and in the dugout for a couple innings. And Hunter Bilbrey got in his 2nd game of the week. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________The previous night Pinnacle lost a tough game and we had a roller coaster win. You could watch this game and easily figure out who had won the night before and who hadn't. The Pinnacle team was energetic and really gave some fight to win. And win they did. They made some spectacular plays (1b over the fence catches twice) and we just didn't have the focus to make pitches against a really good hitting team. The good thing about our team is that we really don't know who we are playing against from one game to the next. This allows us to come out without fear, but it also doesn't allow us to understand when you are facing a top 10 caliber team, that you really have to bring your A game. Noah Kelly had a solid game with a bomb and base hit to the right side, Cooper Gray made some great adjustments at the dish for a couple RBI's, and Stan Gawelko (although he would like a pitch or two back) threw very good in his 3 innings of relief. Need to finish the week strong with a Thursday game at North Canyon. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________4/3/12 4/3 OC 10 - Ridge 9 What a roller coaster of a game and would it ever be any other way in this rivalry matchup? If you split the game into 3rds it would be much easier to describe. 1st 3 innings - We came out like gangbusters. Hammering the baseball and making pitches. Noah Kelly hit a bomb to get us started, but the tone was set when Wes Sutton crushed the first pitch of the game for a line out to center. Owen Sanborn then left the yard later in the inning to get us a 4 spot on the board. In the 2nd we were able to manufacture a run and took a 5-0 lead. Not wanting to really put the game away we would let them back in. 2nd 3rd innings 3 -6 were typical of just not playing confident baseball. We made errors and compounded them with hits or walks Offensively we just couldn't get the job done with guys in scoring position and less than 2 outs. Nicko Ortega threw a much better game than the results will show. We have to help him out. Michael Gonzalez was big in getting us out of the inning without too much damage so we could keep the game within reach. Gonzo also had a great sac fly with 2 strikes in the 5th, nulified again by a leaving early call. 3rd 1 inning- Jade Bilbrey was huge on the mound in the last 3 innings of work allowing us into the 7th with a 2 run deficit. After a leadoff double from Cooper Gray, we attempted to leave him stranded, but a walk and huge hit from Josh Fogerlie off the bench cut the deficit to one. We work some great at-bats to get 3 walks and a hit batter in the inning to take a 1 run lead. In the bottom half Jade shut the door and Austin Daus made a real tough catch to end the game. Game ball- Josh Fogerlie had the toughest at-bat of the day coming off the bench in the 7th with 2 outs. Alumni - Zack MacPhee, Maverick Lasker, Hunter Bilbrey all in attendance at the yard today. Great to have their support and exciting for them to see the new generation of Eagles. Todays game was played in honor of the "spread the word, to end the word" campaign. It is good for our boys in the midst of being so worried about getting right, to take a step back and realize that we can make an impact with something that we take for granted each day...baseball. It was great to see 3 OC students throwing out the first pitch, including our newest addition to the Injured Reserve list, David Sederstrom who broke his leg the previous game.
This was a hard fought and well played game on both sides. Make no mistake this is a solid Sheldon team with a real good lefty on the bump. If nothing else I feel really good about the pitching we have faced over these past two weeks. We will not surprised by any better guys the rest of the season. Sheldon just did not make any mistakes. They played fearless on groundballs and ran down some fly balls. Our guys played very well, following a gritty performance from Cameron Ming, who took a groundball off the shin in the first inning but battled for 5 strong. Stan Gawelko got back on track on the bump throwing 2 solid innings. Austin Daus had a good day at the dish with a great bunt single and line drive up the middle. I feel like we took a big step in the right direction today as a team. One more game to go with this tourney, then back to the wonderful world of Arizona Power Points. 4/4 OC 3 - NC 7 ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3/27 OC 2 - Sheldon 3

BTW - Only thing worse than losing, is seeing the team that beat you walk out of the complex with U of O gear on.

3/26 OC 2 - Columbine 7

Condolences-3/21 OC 2 - Rogers 3 8 innings

Positives- Nate Calles caught a good game and had an RBI single. Jade Bilbrey had a huge at bat off the bench in the 7th. He covered on a hit and run, then drove a 2 strike pitch to the outfield to tie the game up. It is good for us to play these close games. Hopefully next week we will start getting over the hump to come out on top. The good news is that we are seeing what needs to be seen in these tourney games to get us lined up for the last 3rd of the season, whether we like the answers we see or not. 3/20 OC 5 - Broken Arrow 6

3/19 OC 7 - Memorial Ok 9

What a day-Back on track-Gameball-Break time-Pitching and Defense-Gameball-Next up-Alumni- Baseball-Turning Point-Gameball-Things to ponder-3/7 OC 12 - Kingman 0
GameballAt Bat of the day-Fight -Gameball-Alumni- Good week-Gameball-Clean-up-Little things -Gameball-Improvements-2/25 OC 8 - Gila Ridge 3

Energy-Gameball- Good week2/24 OC 6 - Kofa 4

GameballControl -2/23 OC 10 - Corona Del Sol 3

1st Pitch - Gameball-1st Varsity hit2/22 Basha 4 - OC 3 Finally the season is here. We started off with a good baseball game today. The kind of game that coaches hope for in the beginning of the year so we can start seeing if we can execute the little things to win ball games. We started with an early deficit being down 4 runs after 3 innings. The score could have been worse, but we did a great job to minimize in the 2nd. Basha had bases juiced no outs with their best hitter up and 3-0 count. We found a way to get a sac fly, and 2 more flyballs to get out of the inning only giving up 1 run. After the 3rd inning it was the Jake Harner show. Called up from the JV squad on tuesday, Jake came out and dominated the last 3 innings giving up only 1 hit and shuting down the Bears offense. That gave us the momentum swing to start scratching away at the deficit. A Cooper Gray double in 5th followed but Wes Sutton base hit, eventually scoring on a sac fly, got us back in the game. Another run in the 6th was all we could muster, coming up 1 short. Play of the game-

In the movie "The Natural", the knights are stuck in a slump and the sports psychologist is speaking to the team about how losing is a disease as contagious as the common cold, etc. The Eagles are stuck in that part of the movie right now, playing bad baseball where everyone weakness or mistake is amplified. The fearless competitors have been humbled into timid play-it-safers. We need to get some lightning bolt insignia patches to right the ship. Today we gave up 5 singles and lost 7-2. That would be a sign that we are not playing well. We are looking around waiting for someone to step up and get us back some momentum. Hopefully we get things turned around quick, starting tuesday.

The Eagles family wants to pass on our condolences to the family of John Moody, who passed away this past weekend. Son Josh (07 grad) is a former pitcher for the Eagles and wife Bonnie a great bus driver. John will be most remembered for the pride he had in watching his son have a great career for the Eagles.

We faced a quality team today and in doing so had as many errors as hits. Tough combo. We were 3 plays away from shutting that team out. Great efforts from Nicko Ortega and Cameron Ming on the bump today. Again we are learning the plays that have to be made to win these close games. Unfortunately we are learning them in hindsight.

We faced a quality opponent today in Broken Arrow. Both teams pitched in well and played with good energy. I thought the pitcher we faced was probably the best one all season we have seen and we battled for 9 hits against him. Jade Bilbrey started on the mound and was very solid against a good hitting team. We did a good job of scratching them first with a run in the first and 2 in the second. We also held them at bay with double plays in the 3rd and 4th innings to kill rally's. In the 3rd Brandon LeBoeuf ran forever to catch a ball in the gap, then Greg Saenz had a perfect relay throw to get the guy at the dish trying to tag from second. In the 5th our magic ran out when we had 3 costly errors that could have kept them off the board and the momentum in tact. Michael Gonzalez came on to give us a strong relief effort keeping the game in reach going into the 7th with the score 6-3. Our competitive spirit came through again and we manufactured 2 runs with a walk by Daus, double from Erickson and single from Cooper Gray. We had the tying run on second with 2 outs but just couldn't get him in.

2 sides of coin- On one hand we played good enough to beat a lot of teams. I liked the energy and competitiveness. On the other hand we won't be able to beat teams like this if we can't make the plays in the clutch to squash momentum.

Well we showed how tough the game of baseball can be if you just expect to show up and win. First double header of the year for it and it showed. Our pitching staff struggled giving up 14 hits on the day and 6 of the 9 runs were givin up with 2 outs. The coaching staff felt like mentally we just were not in it, as attested by the plentiful mental lapses on both offense and defense. Hopefully this will be a wakeup call for our guys to not take any team for granted. Offensively the coaches feel that we need to really take a look at what the team needs with each at bat. There were times when we allowed them to throw 4 successive balls then swung at the next pitch out of the zone. We have to have a team mentality to get things clicking offensively. On the bump we just can't expect to win games when we give up 14 hits, 4 walks and 4 Hbp in a 7 inning contest. Up next Broken Arrow Oklahoma.

Neither rain, nor fieldwork, nor a doubleheader split could ruin the day when Peyton Manning decided to become a Bronco!


3/19 OC 9 - Hennessey Ok 0

We jumped out to an early lead in this one then just couldn't get the last run to finish the game early. We were up 9-0 after 2 innings so we had four chances to push the winning run across and couldn't do it. That meant more at-bats for our guys which may help down the road. On the bump today our pitching staff tallied 13 strikeouts over 7 innings with Andrew Hull going 6 and Cooper Gray getting his first action on the bump to finish, striking out 2 of the 3 he faced. Offensively we helped our cause with 7 walks and 3 hit batters on the day.

Gameball - Andrew Hull was in control today shutting them down in his 6 innings of work.


3/16 OC 13 - Ironwood 3

Finished the week very strong. Today we got our hitting shoes strapped back on with 18 hits in 6 innings. We put up 13 runs, against the other Eagles of Ironwood, 9 of those runs were driven in with 2 outs. After a leadoff double by Owen Sanborn in the 2nd, Cooper Gray drove him in to get us on the board. To quick outs into the 3rd inning, then we broke out for 7 runs in the inning on 8 consequetive hits. Not wanting the game to be too easy we gave them back 3 in the bottom of the 3rd to keep the chase on. Then in the 5th we drove in 4 more runs and a solo in the 6th to end the game. We ran the bases today pretty good, highlighted by Greg Saenz sneaking in a run after the relay man caught a ball and put his head down walking into the infield.

With some changes in the lineup we mixed our typical middle of the order down to the bottom and they all responded with Owen Sanborn going 3 for 4 with a triple, Greg Saenz 2 for 3 with a double, Jade Bilbrey 2 for 3 with a triple and Cooper Gray 4 for 4 with 3 RBI's.

Out of the 4 hole today Adam Alvarez had a great day with a 2 run bomb in the 3rd, followed by a perfect push bunt in the 4th.

Our season is split into 3rds with the 1st 3rd being completed today. Now we put together about 9 tournament games over the next 2 weeks to get all our guys some opportunities to earn their innings for the last 3rd. We hope to come out of these tourney games with our roles established so we will be ready to finish the season strong.

3/13 OC 6 - Pinnacle 4

Great game for us to get back on track. Pinnacle is a very solid program and we really had to work to get the W tonight. We were very efficient scoring 6 runs on only 4 singles. The starter for their team threw a nasty cutter that gave us fits, but when we got guys on base we were able to put a little pressure on them. It is easy to read the boxscore and assume they gave us the game on 4 errors, but I think it was a credit to our guys really getting down the line and making them make some tough plays. Adam Alvarez has 3 hits including a huge RBI single in the 6th to get us a little cushion. Brendon Erickson was productive at the dish and on the bases scoring a run and driving in a run on a sac fly. The other lone hit came from Austin Daus on a big RBI hit and run single to centerfield.

Our defense made plays today, turning 2 big double plays and minimizing the 9 hits from the Pioneers.

Nicko Ortega was huge on the bump for the Eagles today, throwing 5 strong innings to get the victory. His fastball command was solid and minimized his pitch count to get him through 5 easily. I am very proud at how he handled a week off and really took advantage of today's opportunity.

One more power point game friday at Ironwood, before we take a 2 week hiatus to play in our spring break tournament. Have to finish the week and first 3rd of our season strong
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3/12 OC 2 - Brophy 10

Well the 8 game winning streak comes to an end. Some of the little mistakes we have been making all year, we just could not overcome tonight. In the first couple innings we had the chance to get out of the inning with little to no harm, but just couldn't make the play to escape. On the offensive side we just looked real uncomfortable at the dish, not putting together quality swings or at bats. They broncos had a much better performance on the mound and at the dish this game so we can tip our cap to losing to a good team, but we need to be better than tonights performance.

Great to see Tommy Lay, Tyler Doolittle and Tyler Rose at the yard tonight. Great to have the older guys come around and let our guys know they are being followed.

The great thing about baseball is that we don't have to wait a week to get back out there. In fact our turn around is less than 24 hours to get things going in the right direction.


3/9 OC 6 - Ridge 4

Like many parts of the country (Alabama, Oregon, Ohio) it doesn't matter how your season goes, it only matters how you do against your rival. So even though we have had a phenomenal week, we knew the importance of this game. In order to stick with tradition we let Ridge out to a 2-0 lead, then chased things back in the 3rd thanks to a solo blast from Brendon Erickson and a big RBI double from Noah Kelly. Cameron Ming and the defense cruised into the 6th from there, while Brendon launched a 3 run bomb in the 4th. We tacked on another run in the 6th, so giving up a 2 run homer in the 7th only finished the game at 6-4.

We had the chance to make this an easy game. Up 5-2 in the 5th with bases juiced and no out s...we just could not get a productive out to break this thing open and gave them back the momentum. Then in top of the 6th we allowed them to get the bases loaded with 1 out... but got a K and groundball to keep them off the board. Getting Michael Gonzalez off the DL today was a big lift for our pitching staff.

Brendon Erickson had a complete game at the dish today. Not only did he go big fly in his 1st two at bats, he also went double to the gap to complete his day. He has been working with Coach Easley to get on track and it finally clicked today in a big way.

Great crowd energy today. Starting to develop a real following for our guys. Jake did a fantastically tasteful job today.

A very good clean game today with Josh Fogerlie and Stan Gawelko combining for 5 shutout innings. Defense was solid and the sticks continued to be swung from the previous night. We started off with 2 walks to open up the game, followed by 6 straight hits. In 4 innings we strung together 11 hits, including multiple hits from Noah Kelly (2), Cooper Gray (3), and Greg Saenz (2). Now the goal is to finish strong in Rivalry Week.

- David Sederstrom was outstanding today in the dugout and bouncing out to get helmets and bats. That boy realy gets a bounce in his step when his boys are playing well.

Cameron MIng got a big pinch hit appearance today. To prepare he went down to the cages and really dialed in his swing on the T. Only to get up to the plate and get hit with the first pitch. Baseball Gods have a funny sense of humor sometimes.


3/6 OC 16 - Brophy 10

The little things escaped us for an inning and a half today. Playin catch, knowing signs, executing baserunning, covering first... Then for 5 and 1/2 innings we put it all together. After the first inning and a half we were down 9-1, de ja vu from last season. We had to decide were we gonna fight or was this going to be a short game afternoon? We this team decided to fight! Facing one of the top arms in the state with multiple scouts in attendance, to watch our 3rd base coach presumably, we rose to the occasion and swung the sticks. We swung the bat so well today from 1-9 in our order with highlights in the second coming from RBI hits from Saenz, Erickson and Sutton. After 2 innings we were only down 9-4. In the 3rd we answered a solo run from them with 6 of our own to tie up the score. Big RBI hits came from Austin Daus, Cooper Gray and Saenz. From there the offense kept rolling and found a way to manufacture 6 more runs to end it at 16-10.

Two things that really stood out to us today was the fact that we weren't physically overmatched, and that we finally had the right kind of guys who had some fight in them. Our guys have some pride and really don't like looking bad, So after that first 1 1/2 innings we really had to get after it.

Again Jake Harner was dominant in his outing. Going 5 strong innings and he had them baffled with 3 pitches in the strike zone at any count.

Cody Kimes and Zack MacPhee were in attendance for portions of the game and again were too big league to stop by and give the coaching staff a shoutout.


3/1 OC 9 - Wilow Canyon 6

The greyhound loves to chase the rabbit. With that in mind we gave up a 5 spot in the first to get our energy flowing. Coach Martin really had his players ready to swing it today, and they did so with some bad intentions in the first. The Eagles got back on track by scoring 2 runs with no one on and 2 outs in the bottom half, highlighted by a big 2 RBI double from Jade Bilbrey. Cameron Ming settled in in the 2nd and threw 3 innings of 3 up 3 down work. The offense chipped away with another run in the secondon a great hit and run from Stan Gawelko, and RBI single from Wes Sutton. We pull away in the 3rd putting up 6 runs on RBI's from 6 different players. Again we had 4 clutch 2 out hits to score some huge runs. Nicko Ortega came in to close the door from there, striking out 5 in 3 innings.

2 big power point victories to start the season. It is tough on our pitching staff to only have 2 games in a week though because we only used 4 out of our 8/9 pitchers. There will be 3 games a week the rest of the way out.

Wes Sutton stroked the ball today going 3 for 4 with 2 RBI's.

We are making progress towards putting it all together and figuring out roles for our guys. We really need to clean up some of our baserunning and getting ahead in counts on the bump.


2/28 OC 10 - Deer Valley 3

We came out a little flat today and without our best stuff in the first inning. Josh Fogerlie really had to grind out the first 2 innings throwing 47 pitches. It only took him 30 more to get through the next 3 innings as he cruised. That gave us the time to get our offense in order and rack up a double digit day for hits with 13. After spotting them 3 in the first we started chipping away with 2 in the 2nd with help by a throwing error, and another in the 3rd on an, almost inside the parker, stand up triple from Cooper Gray. We manufactered 1 in 4th then opened things up with 4 in the 5th thanks to two big 2RBI hits from Owen Sanborn and Michael Gonzalez. Andrew Hull had a great outing with 2 clean innings to wrap things up for us.

We have to really work on the little things that could snake bite us in future games. Our baserunning, sign reading and bunting were all below average today. Hopefully we are learning from mistakes.

Austin Daus seemed to be on the bases all day today. Getting on safely 4 out of 5 AB's.

Michael Gonzalez came off the bench to give us a couple clutch hits today. So rather than guys being concerned over playing time, we are actually plugging into the game and preparing to take advantage of opportunities. If we can continue this for 30 games we could really have some fun.

The coaching staff was admittedly nervous about starting 3 of our first 4 games with sophomores, but man did these kids really prove themselves this week. Cameron Ming was dominant for 3 innings on the bump. With a big week coming up and illness earlier in the week, the coaching staff thought it best to shut him down for the day and bring in another sophomore lefty in relief, Corey Wilson. Willie continued the success that Cameron had had. Brendon Erickson through the 7th for his first outing on the bump for the year.
We were able to make calculated pitching decisions after hanging the 8 spot on the board in the first inning, with 11 straight guys getting on base. We did not score another run the rest of the way, due to a quality performance on the bump from the other team.

Much better effort and energy today. After scoring 8 in the first I didn't think we hit cruise control as much as the other kid just made some good pitches and we didn't pile on with the big lead.

Owen Sanborn was 2 for 3 at the dish today, reaching all three times and really tatooing the ball.

- Finishing the first week/tourney 3-1 is nice, but seeing the progress our guys are making on the mound and at the dish is really enjoyable. These kids seem to have good depth and chemistry so far in the season. If we can continue pulling for a common goal, this could be a really nice team.

Another good starting pitching performance helped pick up our team from a flat effort game. Nicko Ortega got the first start of his varsity career and threw 4 solid innings. This allowed the offense to settle in and score some runs with 2 in the 4th and 4 in the fifth to get Ortega the first win of his career. Jake Harner again came in and got the Eagles out of trouble for the first save of his career. Offensively we started to do some things on the bases and at the dish to show progress. 5 different players contributed by driving in a run for the offense. Also of note was Adam Alvarez who caught 7 strong innings in the game, in his first season as catcher for the Eagles.

- Jake Harner again was impressive in relief, earning himself more and more opportunities on the Varsity level.

We can control our effort, work ethic, hustle and enthusiasm every game. We need to "bring it" every game.

This was a good win over a very good program. Josh Fogerlie got his first start of the year and was dominant. He threw a solid 5 innings in 60 pitches. Great first outing. The offense got on a roll in the 3rd inning putting up a 5 spot, highlighted by a Noah Kelly 3 run blast to left. Owen Sanborn and Michael Gonzalez also had clutch RBI hits in the inning. Offensively we really started to put some good at-bats together. Austin Daus, Jade Bilbrey and Noah Kelly all had multiple hit games.

Travis Lane came out to the yard today to throw out the first pitch for the Eagles. A 2008 region player of the year, Travis went on to success in college that got him drafted in the 41st round by the Royals. Travis reports to spring training tomorrow and we wish him well in his career.

Josh Fogerlie. Pitchers who throw strikes and work ahead can really make the game look easy.

- Noah Kelly. Gets his first hit with a liner off the pitchers foot, earning him a milkshake from Coach Weber.

With bases loaded 1 out in 6th, Noah Kelly hit a fly ball down the left field line. Their left fielder made a great diving catch on the play. The umpire was caught up watching the great catch and failed to notice that we tagged up at 3rd base on the play. Instead he called us out on the catch and at third, ending the inning and the rally.