Regrouping authoritatively from a humbling six-inning, mistake-marred 16-6 loss at 3A Pagosa Springs not two full days before, the Ignacio Bobcats roared back into form Saturday, May 13, in more-distant Westcliffe.
Helped by a five-run sixth inning and a three-run seventh, IHS grabbed the first of two games at Custer County by a final 10-2 margin. Game 2, however, was all Ignacio; the ’Cats clawed out five runs in the top of the first, and later put a five-spot up in the fifth to ultimately prevail 12-0.
Closing out regular-season play standing 14-8 overall, 4-2 in the 2A/1A San Juan Basin League, and 10-4 against 2A Southern Peaks opposition – including CCHS – prior to joining the SPL for postseason district-level play, IHS got a complete-game, no-hit performance on the mound in Game 2 from Phillip Quintana. The junior right-hander walked three of the like-named Bobcats (7-14 overall; 4-8 SPL) and plunked one with a pitch, but struck out nine.
Offensively, he went 2-for-4 with one run and one batted in. Junior Devante Montoya finished 1-3 with a double, walk and two runs scored, and senior Eppie Quintana went 1-3 with a sacrifice fly, two runs and one RBI. Freshman Stoney White Thunder went 2-3 with a walk and two runs, and senior Dylan McCaw ended up 1-2 with a walk, two runs and one RBI.
Custer County’s cause wasn’t helped by a reported nine fielding errors, either.
Seven Ignacio players rapped at least two hits apiece in Game 1, with Montoya going 2-for-4 with a sac-fly, double, triple, one run scored and three batted in. Freshman Ambrose Valdez went 2-4 with a run and two batted in, and Phillip Quintana ended up 3-4 with a run. Senior Eppie Quintana went 2-for-5 with two runs scored, and junior Marcus Maez was 2-3 with a walk and two runs. Senior Zane Olguin, however, reached base all four times he stepped into the batter’s box; he singled twice, drew a walk, was hit by a pitch, scored one run and plated another.
White Thunder (2-4, R) started on the hill for head coach Duke Baker and earned the win after working 6-2/3 innings and scattering four hits. Throwing a reported 102 pitches, he walked only four hitters and struck out eight. Marcus Maez then came on in relief and recorded the final CCHS out using only one delivery.
In the aforementioned loss at PSHS, Montoya went 1-4 with a two-RBI double, and scored twice. Eppie Quintana hammered a sixth-inning RBI-triple plating Montoya for Ignacio’s last run and ended up 2-3 with a hit-by-pitch and a run scored. Phillip Quintana went 0-2 with a walk, an RBI-groundout, and was tagged by a first-inning pitch – leading to him scoring the contest’s first run via a White Thunder opposite-field single to left.